The Story of the Earth Sage of The Leaf
by TheEpicStoryteller
Summary: This story changes the events that happen at the end of the anime and the manga. It also has a different protagonist and a new and very relevant final villain for the Naruto series. Prepare yourself for new characters, new villains, plot twists, revelations that were not covered in Shippuden, and a different ending for Naruto in the inspiring story of The Earth Sage of The Leaf.
1. Chapter 1: A New Path

**Chapter 1: A New Path**

He kept on walking. The map he had was damaged by the heavy rain, but he knew that he had been following the correct route. The rain had stopped and every minute that went by made him feel closer to reaching his destination. He had been travelling for days towards "the hidden village among the leaves," better known as The Leaf by other ninja alliances.

He had heard of the third Hokage's deeds and of how The Leaf had been the ninja clan who's ideas of peace for their people had been the strongest. This had been the case since it was founded by their first leader, the first Hokage Hashirama Senju. And since then, they had been the ninjas that had come closest to fulfilling the ideal of peace and a war-less life for many of their people—especially for the kids.

His clan and his own village had been very different. He was born in one of the small villages that were adjacent to The Hidden Village of the Stone. He and others at his home village became adept users of special Earth-based jutsus in order to protect themselves during the wars of clans. They joined forces with the larger clan of the Stone Village, but they still suffered many losses throughout the wars, and the great home village that he remembered from his childhood was now gone, along with most of its people. Nonetheless, the Clan of the Stone was fixated on expansion and foolish rivalries with the other clans, instead of finding a way towards peace, and fighting for it.

He had enough of it. His family and his friends were dead; and now the Stone Clan was going to put him and the few others left from his village as members of a new Anbu Ninja Division. This wasn't the future that he wanted and it was against the ideals that he desired. He wanted change, and they offered to make him an assassin to bring forth even more death. Unfortunately, the few other ninjas he knew and everybody else agreed. He was the only one who saw things differently.

One day he decided that he would make his ideals come true. He was still young at 24, so he felt he had the chance, the time, and the determination to fight for a better future without war and conflicts. He knew he couldn't do it alone though. Then, the path for him became clear: he decided to leave his war-thirsty clan and to join the Clan of the Hidden Leaf Village, led by the third Hokage.

He knew many would call him a traitor and even a coward, but it didn't matter, because he also knew they would not join him to fight for peace. The clan with the closest ideals to his own was the place where he would have the best chance to make them come true.

Two months later, here he was, closer to The Leaf than ever before. He closed the old map and kept going. Something didn't feel right however; he should have been intercepted by ninjas or by undercover Anbu agents of The Leaf by the time he got there. Such an important place had to have a skilled group guarding its perimeter for sure. Then, he saw it: he saw what looked like the entrance of a village!

He put away his map and proceeded with caution because he also saw two gatekeepers at that entrance—and there could have been many others hidden in the area. They could think he was a spy or a trap and attack him head on. He was ready for battle, just in case, but his true intention was to join them. He removed his orange cape so that they could see he was not carrying special weapons or armor. He was concerned though; he had not fought against any Leaf shinobi before and was not aware of any special techniques they could use. He hoped that there would be no confrontations and that talking to them would be enough. He continued walking straight towards them.

The two guards noticed him:

"Hey! You with the orange cape, stop right there!" said one and took out his two fire knives.

"Identify yourself and don't get any closer!" shouted the other while unsheathing his katana.

"My name is Pedro Namikaze and I come in peace."

The stranger left his cape on the floor and dropped his sword to show that he had nothing to hide.

"Namikaze? I haven't heard that last name since the news of the fourth Hokage's death, after the attack of the demon fox," whispered the guard in the right while holding his katana tight.

"Are you a rogue ninja!?" yelled the one with the two knives when he realized the stranger wasn't wearing a bandana with the sign of his clan.

"Why did you come here? What do you seek?" asked the other guard while looking straight at this stranger that was just about twelve meters away.

"I want to join The Leaf Village. I want to join forces with you and to stay here to fight for peace."

Pedro's reply was sincere, but the distrust apparent in the two gatekeepers increased even more when they heard that.

"The Leaf Village is five miles away taking that path," said the one with the sword.

The other one looked ready for battle with his two fire knives.

Then, it happened like a lighting flash that no one expected.

The ninjas that had been hiding in the trees made their move!

NEXT CHAPTER / EPISODE: The Ambush


	2. Chapter 2: The Ambush

**CHAPTER 2: The Ambush**

Two shurikens and a knife with a massive explosive tied to it came flying towards the two gatekeepers from each side. The one with the sword managed to deviate the explosive knife with a knife throw of his own, and he intercepted a shuriken that was going straight for his face with his sword. However, he was hit in the body by the other shuriken. The guard of the twin fire knives intercepted the other two shurikens that were directed at him, but he couldn't stop the second explosive knife and he got hurt when it exploded not too far from him.

For a second there, they thought that this ambush was a trap led by the ninja without a clan's badge, but soon they were proven wrong.

Two more explosive knives were thrown towards them, but before these could reach them, the knives got shoot and exploded in mid-air. The soil in front of them also rose up and created an Earth wall to shield them.

Pedro had used the Earth shot and Earth cover jutsus, which were Earth-release techniques from his original village. (Jutsus are special techniques in the world of Naruto. Some can be learned from practice, but many, such as the sharingan eye's techniques, can only be used by ninjas that are descendants of certain bloodlines and clans. Very few ninjas can use more than two types of special techniques.)

He quickly grabbed his cape and shot two more Earth-released bullets at high speed to the left and right. Both were directed to the places where he saw the shurikens and the explosive knives coming from. And sure enough, a ninja felt down from the left tree and a masked guy jumped out from the other one with a katana in hand to attack.

Pedro threw his orange cape in the air in front of himself. The masked ninja reached him quickly and slashed the cape with his katana, but he was not there anymore. Was this another jutsu technique or just a pure feat of speed?

"Earth-hold jutsu!" said Pedro while he made hand signs that finished with him closing his hands together. Right after that, the two parts of the ground to the left and right of the guy that attacked him rose up and grabbed the ninja by the waist. The guy realized he was trapped, so very quickly he launched his other two knives with explosives attached straight towards Pedro.

"Earth-style grab no-jutsu!"

He, once more, made the ground in front of him raise up, but this time it was different: as soon as the ground that rose came in contact with the explosive knives, he stopped his hand gestures, closed his hands, and extended them towards the trapped ninja. The two mounds of soil and grass, not only grabbed the airborne knives, but also went straight towards the ninja that was stuck since his last attack. One knife exploded and destroyed the mound, but the other didn't.

The trapped ninja's eyes said everything. He knew this was likely to be the end of the line for him. Once the mound of soil crashed with him, the other knife also exploded.

Meanwhile, two other masked ninjas had jumped out of their hiding spot to attack the two gatekeepers. Pedro's Earth-style shield had to cover the front side for both of them and it wasn't a particularly large or powerful one. It left their back and other positions wide open for any attack. The guards had been hurt in the previous surprise attack, so their odds weren't looking great, but they also had a couple of tricks of their own.

The guard of the red fire knives jumped out and made his move before the other two could land an attack on them. He made his technique's hand signs and quickly placed his knives at an angle in front of his face.

"Fire-style Katon Blaze no-jutsu!"

The blaze of fire that he launched forward was split in two parts by his knives. Both masses of fire went straight towards the two enemies from two different sides. One of them got hit pretty badly by the attack and the other got caught by the fire, but didn't take a direct hit. The first one didn't get up again, but the other used his strongest elemental technique right away:

"Water-style twisting stream no-jutsu!"

The gatekeeper used his Katon fire attack once more, but he didn't have time to launch the full blaze. As a result, his fire stopped half of the wild stream of fast-moving water, but he was hit directly by the other half. To make matters worse, another enemy ninja came out of nowhere to attack them.

The guard of the sword knew it was his time to act. He didn't know any special jutsu or technique, but he was well-trained in the use of weapons. He left his sword and grabbed his two explosive knives instead. Then, he threw them, one towards each of the two enemies approaching. Unfortunately, the attackers were pretty good. Both unsheathed their battle knives and deflected the two explosive knives with their own projectile attacks.

However, one of them got the surprise of a lifetime right after, when the explosive knife he evaded came back to him and hit him along with a mound of soil from the ground. The explosion that followed was pretty bad as well. Thus, the other one took notice immediately and saw that the Earth-release user was back. Clearly, he had defeated the ones who attacked him.

The attacker ignored the two guards and prepared to take out the Earth-style ninja with his water-based attack. He knew that water-style jutsus could penetrate techniques that used the soil.

"Water-style twisting stream no-jutsu!"

"Earth-style double Earth-shoot no-jutsu!"

Both started to prepare their attack at the same time, but before the water technique had taken form, a rock-like fist-sized piece of compact soil had hit the ninja attacker in the stomach. This hit stopped him from completing his attack and, right after, the second shoot struck him wildly in the chest.

"Earth-release projectile techniques are much faster than long-range jutsus of the water style. I guess you didn't know that."

The water-style ninja fell down to the ground and looked like he was out of the game for the moment. The others didn't get up to attack again either. Then, Pedro went to check the condition of the two gatekeepers.

"So this isn't The Leaf, huh? It looks like you have enemies too. Are you two alright?"

The guy with the sword replied "yes," but he was bleeding a little from the right side of his waist. The fire-style user was in bad shape, but at least he wasn't bleeding.

"Thank you for helping us," said the soaked guard of the fire knives, before he paused to breathe.

The wind there was getting somewhat heavy and none of the attackers had raised to finish the job. Then. the owner of the red fire knives said to Pedro:

"These guys may have been after you. I don't think our small village has anything of value to bring a group of skilled ninjas to attack us here, at our front door."

Then, someone they had not noticed screamed:

"You are wrong!"

Pedro Namikaze and the two ninja guards turned around. There was someone else there—not too far from them—wearing a mask like the others, but his clothes were not the same. The others had black clothing and this one was wearing dark blue clothes. He also had his hands and arms uncovered, up to his shoulders. Both of his arms had the same creepy-looking tattoo, starting on his hands and ending on his shoulders. It resembled the double helix form of the human DNA molecule, but the real reason why he had those on his arms was his nickname—which was about to be revealed. It also looked like he was carrying a sword on his back, but not other weapons.

"You three defeated my squad, so I will have to finish you for them, and do the job myself," said the stranger with a decisive voice.

Then, he began to take off his mask, band by band, until his face was fully uncovered. The fire-user was shocked when he recognized the stranger's face:

"Jounen! Is that you?!"

The other guard also looked shocked and somewhat worried.

"An Uchiha like you soaked and pushed back by a water-based attack. Things haven't changed around here I see," said Jounen sarcastically while he smiled maliciously.

(The Uchiha clan is one of the clans that formed The Leaf. Uchihas are well-known for their mastery of the fire-style and their fearsome eye techniques that only those Uchihas who have awakened their sharingan eye can perfom.)

"Where is the Uchiha girl that came with you that day? The one that mentioned she was Madara Uchiha's grand-daughter."

(Madara is a legendary Uchiha warrior of the past that was said to be one of the two most powerful ninjas of his generation, alongside the first Hokage Hashirama Senju. He was also one of the few Uchihas who's sharingan eye evolved to an unprecedented level that had not been seen in centuries. Many Uchihas never awakened their sharingan eyes, and among those who did very few ever reached the other levels of evolution for the sharingan's power.)

The Uchiha guard stood up completely and grabbed his two fire knives:

"So that is why you want to attack us? We will not let you enter this village or harm any of the people here… not even her."

The guard of the sword looked extremely worried.

Pedro noticed this and asked him:

"Who is this guy?"

And the guard replied:

"He is Jounen, a ninja that left our village and became a rogue ninja. He is a wind-style user and was the most powerful ninja in this village when he left, five years ago."

Pedro knew that neither of the two guards were in good condition for a high-level battle. Even himself, an Anbu-level ninja (Anbu ninjas are like secret undercover agents in Naruto's world), was not quite ready to defeat the most powerful ninjas in the continent. One thing was clear for him though: he knew he had to help them; otherwise, Jounen would kill them.

"Kenn, do you really think that an Uchiha failure like you, who never awakened his sharingan; Carl, the good-for-nothing sword-user who can't perform elemental jutsus; and some random Earth ninja can stop me here?!"

Kenn and Carl didn't answer, but despite the bad situation, they would not let him go through. Pedro was ready to help them again. It was clear this wasn't going to be easy. Pedro had also noticed that this guy was the one causing the strong winds close to them. He had to be a skilled wind ninja.

"There is a reason why they call me 'Tornado' Jounen. You will experience it now," said Jounen as he prepared his ninja hand signs to start his first attack.

NEXT CHAPTER / EPISODE: Versus Tornado Jounen


	3. Chapter 3: Versus Tornado Jounen

**CHAPTER 3: Versus Tornado Jounen**

"I will kill all three of you and then I will take the two sharingan eyes of the Uchiha girl!"

"Wind-style wind-vortex jutsu!"

A violent and fast whirlpool of air started to form in front of Jounen, and it began to gather soil, rocks, and dust from the ground very quickly. Then, two others like it began to form in the sides of the first one. In a matter of seconds, Jounen didn't look as visible as before anymore.

It looked like he was covering himself, but Pedro knew this could not be the case because powerful and eccentric ninjas like this guy were not likely to fight in a defensive position. Then, Kenn jumped in front of Carl and Pedro, and reacted to Jounen's first move very quickly with his own fire attack:

"Katon burning blaze jutsu!"

"Don't!" yelled Pedro at him, recognizing that mixing fire with the vortexes could give bad results, but it was already too late.

Right when Jounen noticed Kenn's movement, he followed with his true attack—the vortexes were just a diversion tactic.

"Wind-style hurricane gale jutsu!"

All the moving winds in the place began to move fiercely towards the direction of the blaze, and the violent vortexes that seemed to be for defense, quickly went forward to attack as well. The vortexes engulfed the whole blaze and made the furious fire part of their own spiral of death. This happened way too fast, and by the time the others realized it, the violent vortexes of fire, Earth, and wind were right there.

Pedro realized that this was what Jounen intended to do from the start because if he had attacked with an Earth-style jutsu, the effect would have been the same, but with more soil and dust, rather than with fire. This scenario was even worse. It didn't look like there was any other choice for him now:

He quickly jumped as far in front of the other two as he could and used his most powerful defensive-shield jutsu, before the barrage of death clashed with them:

"Earth-style Grand-Earth-Wall jutsu!"

The whole ground raised in front of him, uncovering what looked like a solid rock wall that was about three meters tall and twelve meters wide. And as soon as the wall went up, the fire vortexes clashed with it with all their fury. The mighty clash was so strong that Pedro wasn't sure that his last defense would be able to hold it.

He could feel, with his hands on the wall, how the other side was starting to crumble. And to make matters worse, he could also feel how fatigue was starting to reach him. He had used several jutsus in the last minutes, and that had depleted a good portion of his body's chakra. He knew he would not be able to use any other jutsus if he depleted the chakra he had left. It had to be conserved at all costs!

(In the world of Naruto, all people have "chakra," or an inner energy, which is what allows them to use jutsus and other special techniques, such as those of the sharingan eyes.)

Unfortunately for them, Jounen was faster and managed to take the upper hand at the beginning of the battle. The fire vortexes weren't going for him, so he didn't waste any time and went for Carl and Kenn while the Earth-style ninja was busy with his defensive attack.

Carl noticed that in between the crazy winds, something was heading straight for him at high speed! He quickly used his sword and blocked the kunai that headed for him, but as soon as it landed on the ground, it exploded! It was an explosive knife, like the ones the previous attackers had used.

Jounen landed nearby with a sword in his hand, and he also unsheathed the katana he had on his back. Jounen knew Carl was good with weapons, so he wanted a close sword clash with him. Thus, Carl's sword and Jounen's dual blades crashed!

Jounen took an attacking position, moving fast and throwing one sword slash after another, with both hands. Carl was forced to be on defensive mode since he only had one blade and Jounen was quite fast, but Carl managed to keep up and he blocked or dodged all direct hits. Jounen could tell that Carl had a chance against him if this was strictly a sword fight, but it was not, and that made Jounen confident.

Before the other two could join Carl, Jounen made his big move. After a few moves, he made a space between him and Carl. Then, he put back the katana on his back and the sword on his belt, and he did several backflips to get away from Carl. He crouched down while he saw that Kenn was also running towards him and Carl, with his two red fire knives on his hands. Jounen smiled—the scenario could not be any better for him to deliver a lethal attack for both of them at once! Then, he performed his hand movements for a jutsu attack!

"Wind-style wind-twirler jutsu!"

The wind began to circle his hand and, as he threw the knife, all of it was transferred to the knife, which began to spin faster and faster while it moved in the air. It looked as if there was a mini-tornado engulfing the airborne knife and making it spin wildly. The lethal knife went straight towards Carl. It was thrown from a close distance and very quickly. Carl couldn't dodge, but his reflexes were fast enough to put his sword in the knife's path. The knife was like an airborne drill that fought against Carl's sword.

Then, it happened. Jounen knew that attacks like his next move consumed massive amounts of chakra in one shot, and they were meant to be used as a last resort or against powerful adversaries only. However, he was overconfident and his superiority complex got to his head; thus, he did it, without hesitation and without considering the consequences. Jounen used his most powerful wind-based attack, the one that had earned him the nickname:

"Wind-style tornado jutsu!"

Jounen's arms and the air he blew through his mouth guided the center of gravity of what started to turn into a horizontal tornado that went straight for Carl. All the winds in the whole area joined the tornado and started to strengthen it. Carl was dealing with the knife, so he could not dodge and was hit directly by the wild twister. The thing continued getting worse as the seconds went by, until it raised and blew Carl away. Carl crashed with the edge of the wall that had been raised by Pedro. Then, Jounen moved the tornado's direction and made it go straight for Kenn. Kenn was better prepared than Carl to cover himself:

"Katon heat-shield jutsu!"

Nonetheless, his minimal shield couldn't do anything against the tornado. Soon, he was also struck by the wild phenomenon and blown away.

Suddenly, Jounen's tornado began to scatter and to become smaller and less violent. Eventually, it was gone, but the harm was already done.

Jounen was left fatigued from using his ultimate jutsu. He looked around and felt satisfied when he spotted both Carl and Kenn on the ground at different locations. He was quite sure that they were not going to get up anytime soon—if they were alive that is. He also knew that if they were the village's front guards, then no one else inside was likely to give him more trouble than them. He felt closer to the fortune that he could make by getting the sharingan eyes of Madara Uchiha's grand-daughter, who was not a threat to him—despite the fact she had an awakened sharingan—because he knew that she was just a pacific medical ninja. He perceived no threat from her. The Earth-ninja was still up though.

After seeing what happened in such a short amount of time, Pedro knew exactly what he was up against. Jounen was a powerful ninja, possibly above his current Anbu level, but he had wasted massive amounts of chakra with his last attack. If he was going to stop Jounen it had to be done now.

Pedro reached for his sword, but he did not have it.

"Is this what you are looking for Earth ninja?" asked Jounen while he took out the sword on his belt.

"You shouldn't have disarmed yourself so quickly for these weaklings. You are going to wish you had been taking your trip somewhere else today."

Indeed, the second sword that Jounen had was Pedro's. This meant he had been watching them and planning his attack from the start, since Pedro arrived there. It also meant he had used his men as a decoy to take Pedro's weapon and as disposable pawns to see what all three of them were capable of, before he fought them himself.

"Instead of using your squad and stealing behind our backs, you should have shown yourself from the start," said Pedro and then added:

"Your jutsus may be mighty, but you are not, and I don't like ninjas that use their teammates as you do."

When Jounen heard this, his blood boiled up. It angered him to see that the Earth ninja would talk that way, even without having his sword, and after seeing him use tornado. Pedro was already starting to see Jounen's fighting style, so he prepared himself for the clash:

"Earth-style Earth-shaper jutsu!"

Two objects raised from the soil and then they materialized into a solid form. They were a sword and a shield. Jounen rushed to attack and another clash of weapons started.

Soon it was clear that the Earth ninja was also skilled, but it was also visible that the sword and shield he had were not going to resist for much longer. The shield, in particular, had started to show some minor cracks.

In a sudden move, such as the one he did versus Carl, Jounen threw Pedro's sword in the air, put his katana on his back, and used another jutsu:

"Wind-style shrinking-vortex jutsu!"

A vortex of wind encircled Pedro and started to become more violent as it began to shrink towards its center.

"This is one of my most lethal jutsus and one that most never managed to avoid! This is as far as you go Earth ninja!"

Pedro used his second best defensive tactic, which was the Earth-sphere jutsu. A solid-looking sphere surrounded him before the vortex could touch him. Jounen felt more victorious once he saw this, and even though he knew he had very little chakra left, he had to continue with a finishing move. He couldn't resist seeing such an opportunity and not using it. Besides, he was already sure that he had everything in his favor, such was his overconfidence. Thus, as Pedro's sword began to fall down and approached Jounen once again, he continued:

"Wind-style wind-twirler jutsu!"

Then, he did with the sword what he had done with the spinning knife earlier: The winds that circled his arms joined the sword and made it spin after he threw it aimed at Pedro's sphere. The sword couldn't reach Pedro, however. Kenn deviated it with a diagonal slash of his red fire knives, which were lighted up with fire! Then, he charged towards Jounen, who barely had any time to take out his katana and block the fire slash. Kenn's knives looked more powerful than before and a certain fire blaze was emanating from them. He clearly had used some kind of fire-style technique on them.

Kenn was fast, but he wasn't landing any direct hit on Jounen. However, Jounen had reached his chakra limit and couldn't use his jutsu techniques. He was forced to use his true last resort technique and had no other choice but to end everything with his next few moves, otherwise he was finished. As arrogant as he was though, he couldn't finish things without first putting down his opponent:

"I heard the whole Uchiha clan was massacred, so you and that girl may be the last ones. It seems like all of you are a bunch of weaklings, unless you awaken your sharingan's full power. But even with the sharingan itself, that girl never looked like much and you never even awakened yours."

Kenn was mad, but he was also trashed from getting struck by part of the tornado jutsu earlier. It was a miracle that he still had the strength to stand and fight—clearly, his apparently useless shield had helped him a little. Jounen was also at his limit, but he had a last card under his sleeve that he was about to use to finish them.

Out of the eight chakra gates of the body, he could open up to two. This was a dangerous technique of taijutsu masters that would put the body at serious risk, but also increased speed, strength, and chakra levels momentarily, even if the person was already out of chakra.

(Based on Naruto's show, those who open all eight gates momentarily attain incredible chakra— comparable to that of one of the nine legendary tailed beasts—but die afterwards. Those who opened less than eight would not die, but their bodies would suffer pain and injuries that were worse depending on the time used and the number of gates opened.)

A slash of Jounen's katana managed to reach Kenn's left arm before he could avoid it, leaving him with another bad injury. Then, Jounen used the opportunity: he distanced himself from Kenn and opened two of his chakra gates, which was his limit for this taijutsu technique. Quickly, he felt the increase of chakra throughout his body and rather than thinking about how to use it, he decided to use it all in another tornado that would finish them once and for all.

Pedro had used his Earth-mover jutsu, combined with his spherical shield, to move himself unharmed out of the shrinking vortex. He landed with both of his hands on the ground and knew that he was out of chakra too. The fatigue he had was going to be a problem to deal not just with Jounen, but with anyone. And to worsen the situation, Jounen could use the chakra gates and was about to unleash another tornado.

Then, he remembered what the old taijutsu master from his small—now gone—Namikaze village had once taught him when he was little:

"It was important to know a little of all arts, even if he made himself an adept of one, and it was just as important to know when was the right time to use each."

The master, who wasn't alive now, had taught him how to open his first chakra gate. And now, Pedro knew that it was the right time to use it.

Jounen also knew that everything was at stake, so he unleashed the most devastating tornado than he was capable of:

"Wind-style tornado jutsu!"

The tornado went forward, but before it reached Kenn, Pedro grabbed him, avoided the tornado's path altogether, and left Kenn nearby. Then, he came back.

Jounen could barely believe what he saw. He couldn't believe tornado was avoided with ease. And this guy was very fast, may be even faster than him. His surprise grew even more when he saw the minor green glow on the skin of the Earth ninja—this was a sure sign of the fact that he had chakra gates open! He could do it too!

Then, Jounen finally understood the urgency of his situation: once his short time with two open chakra gates ended, he would be completely out of chakra, exhausted, hurting everywhere, and most certainly defeated, unless he could beat the Earth shinobi first! It aggravated him to realize that an Earth-style shinobi could keep up with him, a highly skilled ninja of the wind-nature.

"What clan are you from!?

Come now and we will end this!"

Jounen attacked barehanded without weapons and so did Pedro.

"Namikaze clan!" responded Pedro, at the time when their fists and their kicks clashed.

(He was really an Anbu shinobi from the Clan of the Stone, however his true allegiance was always for his original village, which joined the Clan of the Stone.)

Jounen was desperate for finishing the Earth ninja before his time ran out, so he used wind manipulation to attempt a cheap hit. And then, it happened! Both finally managed to land a kick, and since both had open chakra flows it was a truly lethal kick.

Pedro's kick landed on Jounen's right arm and Jounen managed to hit him on his rib area. Jounen felt great pain on his arm and shoulder. Pedro knew that he had at least one broken bone. The time was nearly over for their chakra gates to close on their own. And both felt to the ground after the lethal hits. However, one managed to stand up and grabbed the katana from the ground. It was Jounen.

When he knew that his chakra gates were about to get closed, Jounen grabbed Pedro's neck with his injured arm and raised his katana with the other.

"I haven't been pushed this far in years, but I win at the end. Good bye Earth ninja from the Namikaze clan that I never heard about!"

Before he could finish, Carl yelled his name:

"Jounen!" And, swiftly, he launched a kunai from the ground straight at Jounen's face!

Jounen dodged it by a bare centimeter, but right when he did it, all of his chakra left him and he felt a sharp and painful sword, as it penetrated his stomach. It was Carl's sword, in the hands of Pedro. Carl had thrown the kunai and also threw his sword towards Pedro. Jounen never noticed that Carl was nearby, but Pedro knew from the moment he felt the ground where he had fallen. It was extremely close to where he made his Earth wall shield from before to stop the fire vortexes. He knew Carl was still there and he, purposefully, let himself fall in a position where it would be easy for Carl to attack Jounen if Carl could move. Jounen had already discarded Carl as finished, but Pedro considered that Carl was there.

Jounen fell to the ground and, in serious pain, removed the sword from his body and dropped it. He couldn't move anymore. He thought he was going to die there, but the pain of losing was much worse to him. Unfortunately for him, it was not his time yet and this was not the place where he would die.

The water ninja from his group returned and grabbed him, leaving all the others behind and escaping. Kenn tried to do something, but he was too far. Carl and Pedro couldn't even stand up.

Pedro's chakra gate also closed and he started to feel that he was losing consciousness. It had been a very long time since he had to use such a thing.

From the village's side, he started to feel and hear people running towards them, while everything in his field of vision started to fade away…

NEXT CHAPTER / EPISODE: Love


	4. Chapter 4: Love

**CHAPTER 4: Love**

Pedro Namikaze opened his eyes and he felt how he began to regain his eyesight and his consciousness. He was lying on a bed, inside a large cabin that had many other beds. It looked like a medical place. He saw a light, the soothing light of sunshine, very close to his bed. Clearly, the entrance to the place was very close to him.

Suddenly, he felt the urge to stand up and walk out to the sunshine. When he began to move slowly to sit down, he felt serious pain; he could barely move his torso. Just sitting down felt like a struggle. He realized that his clothes had been changed—he was wearing white clothes now, before he had a black Anbu jacket and the orange cape. He also had bandages all over: on his forehead, on one arm and one leg, and around his rib cage area. It felt like he had been on the bed for a couple of days. He felt the necessity to walk and see the sunshine from the outside.

There was something that looked like a thin walking stick close to his bed. He grabbed it and used it to stand up. Kenn and Carl were lying on beds nearby, but they weren't awake; and most of the other beds were empty. He walked slowly past the entrance and took an invigorating deep breath. His rib area was still hurting, but he felt better now.

Then, he heard it for the first time. It was a beautiful music, the most beautiful and relaxing music that he had ever heard. It came with the wind and made him feel rejuvenated with the sound of every tune that followed. It was a fascinating melody; and it was coming from a close place. He could see that there was someone playing the melody from a piano nearby. He began to walk in that direction when two nurses stopped him:

"Hey! You shouldn't be here, you need more time to recover!" said the old one.

"You will be better in your bed than going there anyways," said the younger one, with a facial expression that made it obvious that she didn't recommend approaching the one playing the melody.

"Let me stay here; I feel better now and feel that the relaxing wind and the sunshine here will help me."

The nurses didn't want to force the stranger and they were informed about what he had done; thus, they allowed him to stay there. The young one also smiled at him very nicely and said, "thank you for what you did," while she entered the cabin.

He, however, couldn't forget the music, so he ended up walking slowly—with the help of the walking stick—towards where the piano was. Along the way, he noticed that there were other people in the village, both adults and several kids. However, no one, not a single one, was close to the piano player. This didn't make any sense to him. The woman that was playing the melody seemed normal and was quite talented. Why was no one else there to listen to her close to the piano?

"May be they don't like the music," he thought; but he quickly realized that could not be possible.

Finally, he came within four meters of the piano and stood there to enjoy the music. He could see her sideways, while she used her hands on the keys. The pianist had beautiful long black hair and she seemed to be around the same age as him—in her twenty's. The tunes seemed to flow from her as she played the melody with her eyes closed. Then, she finished and she stopped playing. She placed her hands on her lap and smiled.

Pedro wanted to give her a serious applause, but he couldn't because he needed to hold the stick with one hand to be able to stand. Regardless, he managed to give her a less prominent clapping for her performance using his other hand on his busy arm. For a while there, she had made him forget about his pain with her music.

"Amazing… simply amazing!" he told her.

"You think so?" she asked, and she smiled once more with her eyes still closed. She already knew he was standing there, even though her eyes had been closed the whole time.

"Of course," he answered with certainty, but he was beginning to wonder how was it that she knew he had been there if she had not seen him yet. The tone in her voice made it obvious that she already knew about his presence, even before he clapped. Actually, this was what motivated her to give a great finish to her melody.

At last, she moved to the side of her chair, facing Pedro directly, and opened her eyes.

Seeing her eyes for the first time, from a close distance, was shocking for him. Her pupils were completely red and, in both eyes, they were surrounded by three red things that looked like blood-colored commas. At first glance, they looked like the eyes of a demon. There was something about those red eyes that didn't look human.

She stopped smiling and Pedro realized that he must have shown her a pretty bad facial expression when he saw how her eyes looked.

"I am sorry, I didn't mean to…"

She interrupted him before he could finish:

"It's ok, you have handled it well. Most people would find an excuse to leave now, and you are saying that you are sorry."

She smiled once again—it was a strange sight because even though she had demonic eyes, her body language, her voice, and her nice smile gave him a sense of peace and vibes of a very friendly and unique individual.

"Are you the foreigner that helped Carl and Kenn to stop the attackers?"

"Yes, I am. My name is Pedro, Pedro Namikaze from the Namikaze clan."

"Nice to meet you Pedro. I am Maida. I used to be from the Uchiha clan, but I have been living in this village for years now."

Pedro felt how the pain started to come back to him all of a sudden. He certainly had some fracture from the last battle or they had operated on him in the village while he was not conscious. He touched his right rib area with his left hand, while he held the stick with the other one. He had blood there, outside of the bandages, and it was not there when he woke up in the medical cabin. Apparently, he really had overdone it by walking all the way there to listen to Maida.

She noticed it pretty quickly, even before he made any obvious gesture that would give up the fact that he was feeling pain. It was as if she could read his mind:

"You are hurt!" she said with a worried voice as she jumped from the chair and came close to him. She quickly placed her hands near the side where he had blood and started to use some sort of medical ninjutsu to heal him. She was a medical ninja and those eyes were very likely to be the sharingans in their awakened state. Then, Pedro realized who she was.

"You must be Madara's grand-daughter," said Pedro to Maida.

She responded with a slightly sad voice:

"Sometimes I wish I wasn't, so that no one would associate me with him."

She looked at him with her dreadful sharingan eyes, which allowed her to see more than what a normal person perceives with their normal eyes. He was uneasy about the way her eyes looked, but he was different than others because he was trying to ignore it; and he wasn't thinking of her as if she was just "Madara's offspring." He truthfully was seeing her more for who she really was—which was something that she wasn't used to. Most people tried to avoid close contact with her after they saw her eyes or if they knew she was from Madara's bloodline. That was the case even if they also knew that she wasn't a bad person. The truth was that Madara's stigma and the mark of her sharingan had burdened her during her whole life.

"My grandfather was an evil man. He never cared about my mother, he killed many, and he was at the center of many clan wars and conflicts. His name is not well-received and many feared the grand power of his sharingan eyes. They know I am not like him, but they still fear my eyes, even though I have told them that I can't do anything extraordinary with them."

Then, the sad look in her face faded away because she had a happy thought. Then, she continued:

"Well, except seeing who people really are and fragments of their thoughts, I can only do healing ninjutsu techniques."

She smiled. And Pedro realized then that she probably knew what he had been thinking since he stood there and listened to her music. May be, she always knew he was there listening to her, even though she had her eyes closed.

He truly tried to ignore the seemingly evil look of the blood-red sharingan marks on her eyes, and it was difficult. However, everything else about her felt almost like a blessing: her melody, her kind nature, and her smile. He took his eyes away from her sharingans and tried to just look at her smile. Then, he smiled too. Despite those eyes, he really had not met anyone like her in a very long time.

Seeing this thought made her happy. She had not met anyone like him in a long time as well. Most of the last people she had met couldn't look at her past the gaze of her sharingans. He was different. And she felt that she could talk more with him than with others.

"I can't even do genjutsu," she added.

(Genjutsu is one of the three types of special ninja techniques in Naruto, which are: ninjutsu, or the jutsu techniques based on the user's natural affinity; taijutsu, such as the open chakra gates mode, which is based on using the body's full potential as a weapon; and genjutsu, which can only be used by those with special eye powers—mostly the Uchihas or anyone who has a sharingan eye, even if they are not an Uchiha… there is also sage ninjutsu, which is a special type of ninjutsu that is connected with nature itself and that very few ninjas possessed in the world of Naruto.)

"That's good to hear, it would be sad to think that your music could have been an illusion from genjutsu," joked Pedro.

Maida laughed at his funny idea and stopped using her healing technique on him.

At that very moment, the pain returned and he realized that he was barely touching the walking stick anymore. He quickly grabbed it, but felt that he was losing balance so he also placed his right foot on the side of the stick. And then, they heard the quick "crack!" The stick broke!

Quickly, Maida grabbed him and placed his right arm over her.

"Oh, that was close," she said.

"Yeah," answered Pedro while he gasped.

"I will take you to the medical cabin."

"Thank you Maida."

"No, thank you for listening."

Maida smiled again. When he saw her smile so close to him, he couldn't help but smile back at her.

Slowly, they went back to the cabin until she finally helped him to sit on his bed.

Then, the young nurse from before asked Maida to leave in a somewhat rude tone, which Pedro didn't like. Right after, and in front of two other nurses, she asked him:

"Mr. Namikaze, who do you want to be your nurse until you recover? Whoever you pick will be assigned to you only and the other nurses will take care of the others."

She sounded almost flirtatious and made it seem sort of obvious that she was expecting to be the one in charge of his recovery. However, he chose differently:

"I want the one who is about to leave the entrance to be the one that helps me to recover."

He pointed towards Maida.

"She!?"

The young nurse was shocked. Why would he prefer that freak with crazy eyes?

Maida heard him and looked back at them.

She was also surprised. There was someone who wanted her to help, rather than one of the other prettier ladies with beautiful normal eyes.

"But she isn't a nurse here, she can't!"

The nurse looked very agitated.

"Does anyone here know medical ninjutsu?" asked Pedro. And the answer was obvious.

"No, but we have what we need."

"I appreciate your concern, but what I need now is a medical ninja. Healing ninjutsu works better and faster than bandages and anything else. That is what I need."

The nurse didn't like it, but she had to accept it and she left a little disappointed. The other nurse, who was in charge of the place, was skeptical about Maida, but she knew that Pedro was right about medical ninjutsu and that they were, in fact, lowering their quality by not having Maida in their infirmary. Then, she placed Maida in charge of Pedro's full recovery. He had requested it himself, so she saw no harm in that.

As the days and the weeks went by, they grew closer and closer together. Maida loved taking care of him and talking to him; and he loved her music and the way she was. He had found in her a woman who was not like any other he had met before; and she had met someone who didn't judge her based on her eyes or her ancestors.

Little by little, her eyes started to bother him less and less. And he felt that he started to care about her and her wellbeing—just as much as she cared about his recovery. He didn't want to see her isolated anymore. She was great and he wanted the other people in the village to realize that too. Thus, he started to bring some of the kids to listen to her music, and he made sure that as many people as possible would see her while she was using her medical ninja skills to help him and others.

What he did led many of the villagers to change their opinions and their hidden fear about her. In particular, the ones who needed healing started to go see her, since it was clear that no one there could help them more than her. She and Kenn had arrived at the village ten years ago, and the village's elder chief had welcomed them, but, because of her eyes, Maida had not been able to establish strong bonds with anyone there. No one, besides Kenn, wanted to spend too much time with her… no one, until now…

Three weeks and a couple of days went by since Pedro woke up on the bed, after the battle with Jounen. He was now fully recovered as if nothing had happened, thanks to Maida. He had met others in the village and got to know the place pretty well. Maida's red sharingans didn't bother him anymore. He and Maida had grown so close that, if you didn't know them, you would think they were a couple.

Naturally, Pedro's story had spread throughout the village. Everyone knew that Kenn and Carl had been able to beat a pretty dangerous rogue ninja because Pedro joined the battle and helped them. Some heard that he was headed towards The Leaf, but he ended up there first—and the rest was history.

He had announced that he would resume his journey to his destination after he was fully recovered. That day had finally arrived; and Maida was not there when he picked up the clothes he had when he arrived—his Anbu jacket and the orange cape had been fixed for him. He wanted to see her before leaving.

As he prepared himself, he began to feel that he was going to miss this village very much; and he knew that he was going to miss her. She had been very special for him.

At the entrance of the village, he had a farewell talk with Kenn, Carl, and others. Everyone thanked him. Then, the chief himself stepped forward and gave him a surprising proposal:

"If you want you can stay in this village. You are like one of us, and we all know that you deserted your clan. That's why you didn't bring your clan's headband."

Pedro thanked him, but he reiterated to the chief that seeing his original destination was important for him.

He could have left then, but he was making more time, hoping that he would see Maida one last time before leaving her village. The thought of never seeing her again saddened him.

Then, she arrived. He saw her walk through the group of people there and past the chief, until she stood there, right in front of him. She seemed worried and not very happy. At that moment, she looked at him and grabbed his hands.

"Pedro, I know that you don't want to leave. And I don't want you to leave either. Please stay here with us and with me. We can go to The Leaf together."

As she finished saying it all, she grabbed his hands harder, and a tear began to slip from one of her sharingan eyes.

He could perceive real love from her towards him and seeing that tear was heartbreaking for him. She probably knew already that he felt similarly about her.

This caring love and the peace that he felt in this village reminded him very much of his childhood at the Namikaze village, which had been destroyed during the wars. These were the reasons that made him decide to stay there, rather than resuming his journey to The Leaf.

"I will stay," he told her with a glad voice.

And, as her sad lips turned into a happy smile, he gently touched her face and wiped her tear away.

"I will be very happy if I stay at this village with you Maida."

They both smiled, and they kissed for the first time. It was not a passionate kiss, but it was a kiss full of the love of two people who cared very much about each other. It was the essence of what true love is.

"The Leaf can wait," he said to himself, once he realized that the love he had found there was more important for him.

NEXT CHAPTER / EPISODE: Empowerment for All


	5. Chapter 5: Empowerment for All

**CHAPTER 5: Empowerment for All**

Pedro Namikaze joined the small village permanently and became one of them. His union with Maida, her hospitality, and her healing techniques, made most of the villagers change their minds about her, despite the eyes she had.

There were harmony, love, and peace in his life, but, despite all these blessings, he also had new worries. He saw this new village as his home, so he began to feel concerned about the people there and about their future.

He noticed that there were no upper level ninjas in the village. He was the only one that would be ready for a special Anbu-level squad, which was a position given to many of the most skilled shinobi from the large clans. However, he knew that there were rogue ninjas out there that were powerful enough to beat a squad of Anbus like himself. Jounen was not one of those, but he clearly was above his Anbu-level.

He had heard stories about some of those mighty rogue ninjas who had even fought with the Kages.

(The Kages are the chiefs, or leaders, of the large ninja clans in Naruto's world. They rule over clans and lands that are the equivalent of various cities in size. They have different names, depending on their clan. The Hokages are the Kages that have led The Leaf since its beginnings. The current Hokage at The Leaf is Hiruzen Sarutobi, the Third Hokage.

The Kages are typically among the most powerful shinobi in their land. They are also the chiefs in charge of the Anbu-level squads in their clans.)

Madara Uchiha was one of those legendary rogue ninjas that fought with Kages. His battles with the First Hokage, Hashirama Senju, were legends in their shinobi world. (This is why they were famous and well-known in Naruto's world.)

Jounen was certainly not one of those rogue ninjas, but he was above the Anbu level. The truth is that Pedro had been lucky, and he knew it. If things had been a little different or if Jounen had been smarter, he could have been dead. That battle made him realize his current limitations and the importance of overcoming them. It also became clear to him that the village was not ready for a major conflict or, even worse, for being involved in one of the wars—and ninja wars were not truly over yet, the last one had ended, but the conflicts among the major clans were still alive; and only The Leaf's clan was known for supporting peace, the others were more war-like. He feared that this village could be wiped out if something like that happened again in the future. It had already happened to the small Namikaze clan, even though the ninjas there were much more skilled than the ones at this village.

After thinking about these things, Pedro felt the need to share his special ninja techniques with the rest of the village that had brought him what was missing from his life—a peaceful community where love and a family life were possible. He also felt the need to take his ninja level to new heights, just in case he had to face others like Jounen once again. He decided that he was going to train himself on a daily basis, until he could surpass his current level. He had to improve the power of his Earth-style techniques, practice his close and long range combat, and learn how to open a second chakra gate, or even more. However, he knew that he alone wasn't enough; more had to be done for the village's sake…

He managed to convince the chief after a very long talk. The old chief understood their position very well. He decided to reform activities at the village because he was also concerned about the way things were and the lack of preparation they had. The few skilled ninjas at the village would teach their jutsus and techniques to others, especially to the younger ones. They would determine the ones best-fit to learn certain techniques and would place them under the supervision of the one that could teach them. Above all, they would motivate and empower everyone at the village to find their natural strengths, as ninjas, and to become more skilled at those, with the help of others and even on their own.

Both, the chief and Pedro Namikaze, had a very clear vision. Then, chief Barton decided to do something else that he had not done before—may be because he was afraid that it would raise the chances of conflict for his village—but his mind was clear, and he knew it had to be done:

"Tomorrow, I am going to send out our messenger with one special letter that I will write today. I will send a letter to the Third Hokage, requesting his permission for our village to join his clan and for our people to become Leaf shinobi and wear The Leaf's headband. I know that is where you wanted to go from the start Pedro, and I believe it is best for our future if everyone here joins The Leaf too."

Pedro could barely contain his emotion!

This was the solution to the worries he had.

The entire village would join The Leaf!

"Thank you chief Barton! This is a wise choice for everyone!"

Pedro's enthusiasm was off the limits. He knew that if they were part of The Leaf, the village would be trained and protected by many other shinobi like himself.

"Let me go to deliver the letter."

Barton had to stop him on his tracks:

"You can't be the one Pedro; it has to be our messenger because The Leaf's Anbu squad that guards their village's perimeter would not recognize you. They patrol the perimeter one mile before reaching The Leaf, so you wouldn't be able to reach the entrance before one of them sees you. They know our messenger and will let him through. Anyone else will be stopped by them, may be even killed if they perceive any attempt to fight them back."

These were interesting news for Pedro. He didn't know anything about this.

"So, you guys already had contact with The Leaf?"

"Yes, but very rarely since our first formal talk. Many years ago, when I was about your age and after my father initiated this village, we had a talk in person with the Third Hokage and with two Anbu squads from The Leaf. Back then, my father didn't want to join them, but he wanted to live here peacefully. The Third allowed it, but we also had to agree to his conditions. One of them was that if we were not going to be Leaf shinobi, then we could not penetrate their perimeter and we had to keep them informed of anything that happened in our vicinity. Then, they picked two of our kids to be messengers for them and no others would be allowed to go through their limits. Also, every three months some of their Anbu come here to gather any information we have."

The information sounded good for Pedro.

The Leaf seemed like a pretty powerful clan, it was good to know that they were closer to the good side, and that he and the others were going to join them soon. However, he felt that he still knew little about The Leaf.

"How did communications go with them after that agreement you had years ago?"

"They kept their word of not interfering with us and we kept ours. Every three months some of them came and once in a while, we would send one of the messengers with information for them. The truth is that they were good with us; they could have forced my father to choose between joining them or leaving this place, and they didn't do that. The Third may be a powerful ninja, but he seemed like a good man and a good leader as well. I believe it was him who allowed us to stay here. It's been years now since the last time I talked to him."

Pedro was very satisfied with the chief's decision; and, deep down, Barton was also very glad that he had finally decided to do it. He knew that they should have joined The Leaf years ago. May be their village would have been much better today if he had taken that decision before, but this wasn't a time for regrets; it was the time to make the right decisions for the future.

The next day, the messenger left early and the chief had a talk with the whole village to motivate them for the new road ahead of them. Everyone had to be empowered to become better ninjas for themselves, for their families, and for the future of their village.

Pedro was chosen to teach his Earth-style techniques to those who seemed to have a natural affinity for the Earth-style, just like him. Maida was selected as the one who would teach current nurses and the younger girls about using healing ninjutsu. Kenn would teach double-weapon combat and fire-style techniques. Carl was the instructor for sword-based combat. And a couple others served as trainers for other groups. Chief Barton supervised the whole thing.

The teaching sessions at the village were only during the beginning of the day, so Pedro was able to start his own training during the afternoons. He would leave the village and practice on his own. He needed this to be able to use his jutsus at full power without damaging the land close to the village. He knew he had to train at his full potential if he wanted to reach the next level. He also wanted to experiment with his Earth-style jutsus, hoping to develop new ways to attack and defend with them.

One day, he stopped at a mountain, not too far from the village, and decided that this mountain was going to be his new training ground. He went there almost every day to train his ninjutsu techniques, his taijutsu chakra flow, and even his sword fighting. Often, he tried to combine all three. He knew he had the potential to raise his taijutsu to the next level, by opening the second of the body's chakra gates.

(There are eight chakra gates in total; opening each new one raises power, strength, and speed exponentially, but places an even greater strain on the body, especially after the chakra flow's time limit is over. It is said that those who open all eight gates gain godly power momentarily, but die just one minute after their chakra flow ends.)

He also knew that it was possible to empower jutsus via training of the user. Great users of the style had the potential to evolve current jutsus into more powerful forms, to combine them to form better attacks, and even to create new jutsus that were not used by other users of the same style.

Many things motivated him: the village, Maida, The Leaf—which accepted their request and scheduled a meeting at their village in two months to validate their alliance—and his own desire for a brighter and better future for all. At last, it felt like his dream of helping to make peace a reality was possible. He, The Leaf, and everyone would make it possible. He wasn't alone, there were many others whom would follow his same dream and The Leaf would help to make it a reality. Those thoughts gave him the drive to train hard every day to surpass his current level and to be the best Earth-style ninja that he could be. He wanted to ensure that The Leaf would recognize him as another great Anbu for the clan.

As the days went by, the people at the village improved and so did Pedro Namikaze. He trained at the mountain from before. He practiced all his Earth-style jutsus, his sword moves, and opening his first chakra gate and controlling it for short intervals—hoping that this control would facilitate his opening of the second one. He perfected and blended his use of the Earth grab, hold, and shoot jutsus to come up with new more powerful attacks, such as a sudden crash of nearby ground areas onto each other and around a large rock—which could have been an enemy. He learned how to make a portion of the ground rise or fall violently, along with anything that was on top of it. He named his new techniques the Earth-style Earth-crash, Earth-rise, and Earth-fall jutsus. He also learned to control the Earth shaper jutsu well enough to make more than a sword and a shield from it.

Finally, after much sacrifice and practice with controlling chakra flow with one open gate, he managed to open the second one. The second surge of chakra from having two gates open at the same time felt two—and sometimes even three—times as powerful as the first. After this, it made perfect sense why Jounen's kick had been so lethal to him; Jounen had two open chakra gates, not one, like he had. Furthermore, even though Pedro closed the two chakra gates just seconds after using them, he could feel that the toll this was taking on his body was worse than with one gate only. Clearly, this taijutsu technique was not his forte and it had to be used as a last resort. He began to understand why it was considered a "forbidden" technique by many, and why even even the great taijutsu master that he knew didn't want to teach him to open more than one gate. It all made sense now…

The time continued to go by, and there was only one week left for the union with The Leaf.

He could not have guessed what fate had in storage for him…

NEXT CHAPTER / EPISODE: Ninjas of Catastrophe


	6. Chapter 6: Ninjas of Catastrophe

**CHAPTER 6: Ninjas of Catastrophe**

Jounen and Jaruko—the water-style ninja that saved him—had recovered from a major defeat. (It took Jounen longer to recover than Pedro because he had opened two chakra gates). They had also assembled a new ninja squad to do their dirty work. However, they weren't going back for revenge anytime soon, even though Jounen definitely felt that he wanted revenge badly. First, they wanted to retrieve the money from the two strange individuals whom had hired them to do the job. Those two had promised a great amount of cash for the sharingans. Jounen's group couldn't bring Madara's grand-daughter or her special eyes, but the job almost cost their lives. And they were going to get their pay out of these guys.

Jounen wanted revenge, but he was going to start with the ones that got him into the mess. And if they didn't want to pay him, then he and his squad would kill them on the spot.

He still remembered them well. They looked like shady characters, but they didn't seem powerful to him. On the contrary, he thought they looked like idiots with their custom ninja clothing. They didn't look particularly tough to him. Besides, the fact that they wanted to pay him for the job made him think that they weren't good enough to do it themselves. This way of thinking was no surprise; Jounen was a very arrogant ninja, even after his last major defeat.

He remembered them as if the day when they approached him had been yesterday:

Both had a black cloak with red clouds on. One had black hair and an orange mask that only showed his right eye. The mask had lines coming out from the hole around his eye and forming a spiral pattern that covered his whole face. The other guy was very white on the left side of his face and incredibly black on his right side. His skin colors were not normal-looking, the white side was white like paper and the black side was purely black like outer space. He almost looked like two different people in the same person because of how different his two sides were. He also had yellow eyes, green hair, and a seemingly lifeless look in the dark side.

They looked creepy, but neither of them seemed particularly strong and they were paying for the job, rather than doing it themselves. Therefore, Jounen never thought of them as a threat. He chose to see them as two clowns that he could take advantage of, since he was planning to take both things from them anyways—the sharingans and the money. He knew where their hideout was, so they would not be able to hide from him.

Jounen, Jaruko, and the rest—which were twenty more ninjas—went to meet these two unknown clients at their secluded hideout, which was the location where they were told to deliver the sharingan eyes of the girl that had them. Everyone was armed to the teeth with explosive knives, sharp shurikens, swords, and more. Jounen was ready to start his revenge with a fat paycheck—or so he thought.

The green haired guy and the one with the orange mask were there when they arrived, but there was a third one too. The third was completely white from head to toes—the same paper-white as the two-sided one—and had no hair anywhere. It looked like he was also wearing the same mask as the other one—revealing only a hole for the right eye and showing a spiral pattern—but his mask was white, not orange.

The three rogue ninjas perceived them right away. In a way, it seemed as if they already knew they were coming, but Jounen didn't pay much attention to these clues.

"Hello there, I believe you didn't meet our friend here last time, his name is Spiral," said the green-haired one with a creepy and sarcastic voice. His two-sided face looked like it was going to smile from both sides. Spiral, on the other hand, showed no signs of facial gestures or emotions at all.

The one with the orange mask intervened quickly:

"Zetsu stop fooling around, let's go straight to what matters here. Jounen, you have taken far too long. Did you bring us the sharingans that we asked for? The ones that were always activated and that belonged to the Uchiha deserter from Madara's bloodline." Zetsu sounded sarcastic, but this guy's voice was deep and commanding. He certainly didn't seem this way when they came to offer the job. This angered Jounen, who made a quick hand signal to his group to prepare them for battle.

"We didn't bring you any special eyes, but we are here to get the payment that you promised us. It won't be in exchange for sharingans, but rather for your lives." Jounen raised his voice, purposefully, to sound tougher than the one that had the orange mask. Meanwhile, all his ninjas had scattered very quickly and they were surrounding Spiral, Zetsu, and the other rogue ninja.

Spiral scratched his bald white head.

"They must have taken this long because they were deeefeeeaateeeed, hahaha; they clearly aren't very strong or smart." Spiral openly mocked them with a comic and burlesque voice. And the worst part was that his statement was right. This mockery got everyone angry and ready to finish them! After all, they were pretty good mercenary ninjas and they were not used to getting this sort of talk from anyone.

"As you wish, we will start with you!" yelled Jounen, and then, the furious clash began.

Jounen unsheathed his two blades and threw them in front of himself with a spinning motion.

"Wind-style wind twirler jutsu!"

He pointed the two spinning blades at Spiral's eye and launched them with incredible momentum. All the other ninjas in his squad launched two of their explosive knives at Spiral from all directions, but all three—Spiral, Zetsu, and the masked guy—were together at the center, so the barrage of attacks was certain to reach and finish all three. Everything happened very fast, so there was barely any time to react, and certainly no easy way to go past the squad that surrounded them.

The explosions covered the center of the hideout in smoke and the sight of Jounen's spinning blades was lost, but they were going straight for Spiral. Everyone waited to see the three challengers dead, but no screams were heard and, naturally, Jounen's men were already asking themselves how could that be possible after having contact with so many knives and explosions from everywhere.

When the smoke dissipated, the surprises began!

Jounen's two blades were impaled in a large wooden branch that had been raised in front of Spiral, and many other strong-looking branches had grown from the ground around Spiral to protect him completely from all attacks and explosions. He had used some strange and extremely rare wood-style jutsu. This kind of thing was unheard of since the time of the First Hokage, Hashirama Senju, who was a master user of the wood-type jutsus, which could not be learned or taught because they were linked to the person's bloodline; therefore, only a selected few could use them. Seeing this was surprising, but it was not the biggest shocker.

The ninja of the orange mask didn't move from where he was and there was nothing protecting him, but he looked completely unharmed. It was as if nothing had happened to him—and that was the case indeed. There was only one noticeable change that Jaruko, the water ninja, was able to see: the right eye of the guy—which was the only thing that his orange mask revealed—was red like blood and it had a black shuriken-like shape in the center. That eye looked diabolical and, clearly, he had used it to do something that no one saw.

Standing besides Jounen, Jaruko whispered: "Jounen, I think this guy has an awakened sharingan eye, we are not ready to fight genjutsu techniques and…" Jaruko was starting to feel fear, but then he noticed Zetsu, the green haired one, was nowhere to be seen! Things were not looking good at all.

Jounen reacted when he noticed that his men's confidence was starting to waive after the new sight. He was not going to let these clowns and their tricks beat him under any circumstance.

"You have your special jutsus and we have ours!"

He grabbed Jaruko's arm and whispered to him, "launch your strongest water attack through my wind tornado," then he pushed Jaruko to the side and prepared his special technique even faster than how he did it before—at the battle versus the Earth ninja.

"Wind-style tornado jutsu!"

The cutting winds were aimed at the sharingan user and Spiral.

Then, Jaruko joined:

"Water-style twisting stream jutsu!"

The other ninjas also threw their remaining explosive knives at the enemies.

The onslaught of cutting winds, wild waters, and burning explosions almost reached the ones that launched it, so it had to reach those freaks as well. There was no way out this time—at least, that's what Jounen's men thought.

After the dark winds, the explosions, and the water scattered, the masked guy was still there with his sharingan even brighter than before. The floor had knives everywhere around him, but he looked unharmed. He looked at Jaruko.

"You are wrong. This eye of mine is not a simple awakened sharingan, it is a mangekyou sharingan. I underwent a second awakening after the first. This is the true power of my sharingan eyes, which surpasses that of normal sharingans."

He said that to Jaruko and then he turned his eye to Jounen.

"You can't take anything from us, but we can take your lives after this defiance. Yours in particular, Jounen. If you had just brought me what I asked for, you would have had a chance." The masked guy sounded like he had unshakable confidence about his power and complete certainty of victory.

Then, a really annoying—almost robotic-sounding—voice came from the ceiling straight above Jounen and Jaruko.

"Oh don't lie! We probably were going to kill them anyways, neither you nor I or Zet have any cash in storage here," said Spiral. The creepy and masked white being was, apparently, glued to the ceiling with wood walls covering his surroundings. He had avoided the tornado and the barrage of attacks altogether!

"Shut up Spiral!" yelled Zetsu from the entrance of the hideout.

"Take this seriously even if it is not much of a challenge for you! Remember what your task here is!" Zetsu looked aggravated. (He had given Spiral orders and guidelines on how to behave and what he could say, but Spiral was doing things his way.)

All of a sudden, Zetsu's voice had changed from sarcastic to violent. He had a particularly evil vibe now that made him look more dangerous than the other two (and he was indeed the most dangerous one). Things got even worse when Jounen's men realized that Zetsu had been blocking the entrance all this time. He would ensure that no one would be able to leave. Some started to panick at the realization of the situation.

Jounen was also starting to worry. Things began to feel just like his last battle outside of the village, but even worse. These guys looked unharmed! At least, the other three he fought by himself barely made it alive. This assault had been turned into a fight for survival almost in an instant. Who were these rogue ninjas?! They were not affiliated to any major clan or any village.

Quickly, Jounen began to think about escaping and using his squad as distraction once more.

"Jutsus don't work! Use your knives, shurikens, and swords! Pierce through them!"

He hoped to make an escape while the two extravagant enemies in the center of the hideout were busy fighting the others. He only had to go through the one at the entrance.

His two blades were stuck in the tree branches created by Spiral, so he grabbed his two non-explosive knives and prepared for close-range battle:

"Wind-style air blades jutsu!"

An invisible blade of sharp winds extended from his knives, giving him the range of attack of two long swords, while he only used—and opponents only saw—the two knives on his hands. He was ready to cut through Zetsu to make an opening and to take him out too. Deep down, he knew he wanted to take him out before escaping. Without wasting any time, Jounen headed towards the entrance.

Spiral dropped himself from the tall ceiling to the ground and when he stopped the fall barehanded, his left arm fell off. He quickly grabbed it and placed it back on the right place. The hand united itself with the shoulder right away. It was clear now that this one wasn't human. Out of fear, the nearby ninjas began to attack him desperately with knives and shurikens, but he raised his wood shields and new tree branches grew from the ground to cover him. Then, the same branches continued growing underneath the ninjas and broke the ground beneath them to grab and trap each one. Spiral walked towards them and looked at them. Then, he raised his hands and another growth of wild branches followed, this time aimed directly at the trapped ninjas. This was the end for all of them.

Another group attacked the masked Uchiha and what they saw left them speechless: he used his sharingan to create a large vortex coming from his eye that sucked in all of their shurikens and knives. Then, he did the same thing again, but this time their shurikens and knives came flying from his eye's vortex towards them! He took out half of them with that attack. Right away, he attacked the others:

"Fire-style fire curtain jutsu!"

He released a large curtain of fire and broke it into pieces that went after his attackers. Most were caught, but this wasn't quite enough and he knew it:

"Fire-style Katon fireball jutsu!"

The large ball of flames took care of everyone in this group, except Jaruko, who had used a large water-based shield to cover.

There was no time to prepare or do any jutsu and the masked man's fire techniques were certainly more powerful than his water attacks, so he unsheathed his sword and charged at him quickly. It seemed like it would work because the masked one had no visible sword or knives. He had no time for other fire jutsus either because Jaruko's sword would reach him before that. However, when Jaruko looked straight at his eye, he started to feel great difficulty to move his sword and his body, until he couldn't take another step. He felt frozen on the spot.

"What is happening!?" He yelled frustrated, but then he realized that he had looked at the eye and it was too late.

"This is the power of genjutsu, the ability of sharingans that can be used to change what other people perceive and how they perceive it. I have a mangekyou sharingan, so my genjutsu is more powerful. There is nothing wrong with you, but you won't be able to escape from my genjutsu on your own and there is no one left to wake you up from it."

The eye beneath the mask took the shape of the advanced sharingan, and he used his unique ability again. The fierce eye created a vortex and two large shurikens came flying from it. This was the end for Jounen's pal.

Jounen knew the two at the center would be busy with his squad, so he went straight for Zetsu with everything he had. He even started preparing himself to open a chakra gate to boost his power and speed. He was fast and ferocious with his invisible blades of wind and his knives. Even though Zetsu dodged him several times, he managed to cut him twice—both times on the white side.

Then, Zetsu stopped and so did Jounen. They were a few meters away from each other.

Jounen used this little time to open his first chakra gate. He was capable of escaping now, but he wanted to take out Zetsu first. Seeing how Zetsu stopped for a while gave him confidence that he could do it quickly.

Black Zetsu whispered to the white side:

"What happens White Zetsu? It's been a while since someone managed to reach you like this. Should I call you by your old name to remind you of who you are?" The end of his whispering had a slightly threatening vibe in it.

White Zetsu felt angry, but there was something stopping him from unleashing that anger:

"Shut up and be on my side; you know I would be much faster if you were not controlling me now. I am sure that you don't want me to call you by your old name either, so don't say mine. Let's take him seriously. Let me do in this battle as I wish. It shall be fun."

White Zetsu was the one that gave the biggest evil vibe when he was serious. And this time he was.

Jounen's chakra gate made him faster and stronger, but Zetsu's speed and power had also increased. They fought in close combat for a couple of minutes until Zetsu landed three strikes on Jounen. The last one cut him badly, but he had not seen Zetsu strike him directly. It made no sense; Zetsu had no knives; he had not done any wind-style jutsu to make air blades; he had not had any chance to perform any jutsu at all; and he didn't seem to have open chakra gates either.

"How did you do this!?" yelled Jounen in frustration, since he didn't even see how he got cut.

"It is called sage chakra. It is something that is beyond what you know, but I can use it to make wind blades like the two you have there. I don't need a jutsu for it because, unlike you, I have nature's force on my side."

Zetsu's two sides smiled menacingly. And his sarcastic tone from before returned:

"Now look over there, it seems like time is up for you Jounen. Thank you for the warm up."

Zetsu pointed to the center of the place with both his black hand and his white hand.

Jounen took a quick look and saw that Spiral and the masked guy were standing, but no one else was. His whole squad of twenty-one ninjas was gone. The situation was far worse than he had imagined.

In desperation, he opened his second chakra gate. Then, he tried to free the entrance from Zetsu with his best jutsu at full power to escape before the other two could join—which would be his end for sure.

"Wind-style tornado jutsu!"

However, Zetsu counterattacked in an unexpected way. First, Black Zetsu separated himself from White Zetsu's body, revealing that the black side was not half of Zetsu's body, but it occupied that half when they were together. Then, Black Zetsu slipped through the ground, almost like a liquid mass that goes through the cracks, and grabbed Jounen from underneath, without him noticing anything because he was too busy starting his tornado. Then, White Zetsu attacked:

"Wind-style tornado jutsu!"

The two wind barrages clashed and cancelled each other out. By the time Jounen realized where Black Zetsu was, he had already drained his body's chakra. Jounen lost the chakra flow from the gates as well, and he could not move—not only was he left without chakra, Black Zetsu was also holding him in place. He could feel that something was controlling him and that his body chose to stay still because that force made him do it.

Jounen felt something that he had not felt in years. Fear. This was going to be the end for him. He could see it coming. And there was nothing he could do, besides talking to them, but that was not his expertise.

"Who are you!? What are you?" said Jounen with his last breath. He was looking straight at White Zetsu.

Black Zetsu knew Jounen was too weak now to do anything else, so he let go of him and joined back with White Zetsu by covering the right side of his body. Once they were together, both smiled. Zetsu saw that the other two were not close to them yet, so he reached for Jounen's ear and whispered his answer:

"We are the son and the brother of the one who created this world of shinobi. We were once humans just like you. Soon I…" White Zetsu stopped talking abruptly and Black Zetsu took over and continued, "…I will have what is rightfully mine."

Zetsu smiled once again, but it was not clear whether White Zetsu or Black Zetsu was the one smiling after the last words. Black Zetsu had the power to control other bodies that he joined with, so it was likely to be him, but no one knew that fact besides White Zetsu and Spiral. No one truly knew who the real mastermind was. The masked guy believed that it was him, but this was part of Zetsu's plan.

Then, all of a sudden, two blades impaled Jounen from the back.

"You are welcome. Isn't that what humans say when they get back something that was theirs?"

Spiral was holding Jounen's two blades—the ones that he had thrown straight at him before.

Then, the sharingan user appeared right in front of Jounen, using his eye's teleportation technique on himself.

"No Spiral, we say thank you. And Jounen, this is what you get for defying Madara Uchiha."

He closed Jounen's eyes afterwards.

"Are we done with this mess now? Uff, look at how much cleaning is needed in this place!" complained Spiral with his annoying robot-like voice. Zetsu answered him:

"No, we will have to look for that Uchiha descendant of the 'real' Madara." Zetsu moved his eyes back to the Uchiha of the orange mask—whom wasn't the real Madara, although he pretended to be him in many occasions to advance his and Zetsu's goals.

"I received information from the clone I sent after Jounen, and he wasn't lying to us. There is an Uchiha girl in that village and she does have sharingans that are always activated. That means that she must be Madara's descendant too. Her eyes can be very useful for our cause."

The masked guy didn't look very happy about that decision.

NEXT CHAPTER / EPISODE: The Special Sharingan


	7. Chapter 7: The Special Sharingan

**CHAPTER 7: The Special Sharingan**

The Uchiha of the orange mask didn't want to waste time looking for someone else's sharingans; considering the colossal plan they had to fulfill and the incredibly dangerous tasks they had to complete for it, there was no time for this now. Clearly, he didn't know Zetsu's true plan, but he believed that he was in charge and that Zetsu's only purpose was to help him fulfill Madara's "Eye of the Moon" plan, which included reviving Madara and changing the ninja world forever.

"Why do you want to go out of our way to get the sharingan eyes of a low-level shinobi like this girl? My mangekyou sharingans are surely more powerful than hers, and only my sharingan eyes can perform space-warp techniques that grant temporary invulnerability to attacks. We don't need another Uchiha."

The masked man crossed his arms, looked straight at Black and White Zetsu, and stated things strongly, as if he was reprimanding them.

Black Zetsu answered first:

"You seem to be forgetting that you only have one of your mangekyou sharingans. When we saved your life, we had to get and implant a second sharingan on you because your left one was gone for good. It wasn't a special sharingan like yours, but we didn't want to have you half-blind around here. You will need another one if you want to be the one that completes the plan."

"Do you really think I need sharingans from someone who won't ever reach my level? You are underestimating me Black Zetsu. The only other eye that I need is Madara's left rinnegan eye, and once I get it I will have my mangekyou sharingan and a rinnegan. I will have the best of both worlds. Then, Madara will be revived and I will be able to finish our plan at last."

(The rinnegan eye is the ultimate transformation of the sharingan eye. These eyes are not red, they are completely violet and have black concentric circles around the pupil—which also turns violet. Mangekyou sharingans turn into rinnegans when the owner undergoes the final awakening of their sharingan. Only two people in the world of Naruto obtained the rinnegan via self-awakening of it: Madara Uchiha and the Sage of the Six Paths, also known as the creator of the ninja world. However, others are also capable of obtaining the rinnegan's power if it is implanted on them via a technique of organ transplants that only high-level medical ninjas can perform.)

Spiral touched the masked man's right shoulder with one finger, as if he was a kid that wasn't sure about whether it was good for him to say something or not.

"As you already know, the first form of the sharingan and its powers are common to all the Uchihas that awaken it, but the mangekyou form and its techniques are unique. What happens if the special techniques of that girl's mangekyou surpass yours?"

Spiral scratched his head with his other hand while he asked the question with his usual comic voice. He didn't sound smart, but his words revealed that he certainly wasn't the idiot that he portrayed himself as.

The masked man removed Spiral's finger from his shoulder before he answered. He was a little angry now:

"Don't be a fool! Only the most powerful of all Uchihas have awakened the mangekyou. A young medical ninja won't ever get such a thing!"

Spiral stayed quiet, but White Zetsu continued:

"The girl is not an ordinary Uchiha. She is Madara's only living descendant and may have inherited some of his eye powers too. We were created to fulfill Madara's Infinite Tsukuyomi and his 'Eye of the Moon' plan that will change the world. Eventually, we will revive him to complete it. And when that moment comes, it would be good if this matter is settled. Madara would kill us if he finds out about it. You know I can judge the potential of a sharingan eye with my ability, so we will know if her sharingans are truly special or not."

For a second, the masked man was a little surprised. Spiral was a fool with power—this is what the masked guy believed, but it wasn't the whole truth. Black Zetsu always seemed to be one of Madara's living tools to fulfill the plan. However, he believed White Zetsu was smarter than the other two. So, it seemed a little strange that all three were in agreement. He could see they were right though. The reality was that if this girl had a special sharingan, just like her grandfather's, then getting one of those eyes would give him the remote possibility of getting a second rinnegan, even before Madara was revived. The odds were very low, but it was something worth trying. And Zetsu would know if her eyes matched Madara's, so they would know for sure.

White Zetsu noticed that Spiral was opening up his void head behind the masked Uchiha. (Spiral wasn't human. He could detach body parts and even open up his whole body and cover someone else's to possess their mind and use their body or to act as a very powerful living armor. He had done this to the masked Uchiha many times before—under Zetsu's orders—but he ensured that most of them were tweaked in his memory to make his recall convenient for them.) Spiral's two hands were also starting to open like two wild carnivorous plants getting ready to devour their prey. His intention was clear, so Zetsu gave him a signal to stop. The masked Uchiha was more powerful than before, so possessing him and manipulating him was not the smartest move now, unless it was necessary. Convincing him was preferred—at least by White Zetsu, who was the one that could control the alien being named Spiral. White Zetsu was also under someone else's control from time to time; thus, the one who was really calling the shots was Black Zetsu—especially when he was on White Zetsu's body. However, unlike Spiral, Black Zetsu was only capable of controlling others' bodies, he couldn't see or change their thoughts. Therefore, he didn't know that White Zetsu was also planning to be the one in charge at the end, so he was going along with Black Zetsu's plan.

(In this story, Black Zetsu is one of the brothers of the legendary Sage of the Six Paths and White Zetsu is his third son, whom's story was never told because his two older brothers, Asura and Indra, were better known than him always and they were also present in the human realm during their whole lives, while he was not. The past of both Black and White Zetsu and why they ended up this way is covered later in the Earth Sage's tale.)

The masked Uchiha saw White Zetsu as the more trustworthy of Madara's creations—they were not Madara's creations, but that was what they made him and Madara believe; he also believed that this was Madara's original plan, rather than just a part of Zetsu's grand scheme to put the new ninja world under his control.

He was certainly closer to agreeing with White Zetsu and the others about the girl, but there was something that he still considered more important, since two "special" sharingans were not the only thing required to complete the grand plan:

"Shouldn't we be hunting the nine bijuus and Madara's existing rinnegan to revive the Ten-Tails to perform Infinite Tsukuyomi?"

(The bijuus are nine giant tailed beasts—One-Tails, Two-Tails, and so on, until Nine-Tails—that possess inhuman amounts of chakra and great power. At one time, they were a single monstrous entity, known as the Ten-Tails. It was the Sage of the Six Paths who managed to defeat and control the Ten-Tails before it could destroy the world. With the help of one of his brothers—not Black Zetsu, but one that was good—he sealed the Ten-Tails within himself.

In Naruto's world, the large clans fought for the bijuus' power and managed to capture them. The nine bijuus were sealed within humans in the different clans, just like Hagaromo—the Sage of the Six Paths—did to control the Ten-Tails. The most powerful of the nine parts of Ten-Tails, the Nine-Tails, was sealed within Naruto at The Leaf by the Fourth Hokage, when it attacked and nearly destroyed The Leaf. The Fourth Hokage sacrificed his life during that attack to save The Leaf.

Initially, Ten-Tails was sealed within the Sage of the Six Paths, but he was forced to release it to ensure that a new threat would not be able to get such power from him. He chose to divide it into nine less monstrous entities and scatter them throughout the world. Only someone with his rinnegan eyes would be able to put them back together to have the power of Ten-Tails resurrected…

The "Eye of the Moon" plan aims to capture all nine bijuus to reawaken the Ten-Tails. Then, Ten-Tails and its limitless chakra would be sealed within one person once again. That person would gain godly power, just like the legendary sage, and if it is someone with two rinnegan eyes—like Hagaromo—he would also be able to cast the Infinite Tsukuyomi. The Infinite Tsukuyomi is an eternal genjutsu technique that would change the world by putting everyone's perception of reality under the control of the caster. Basically, the caster would be a god.

The masked man expected this to be him in order to shape the new world to his liking, but he needed to revive Madara for the two rinnegan eyes that were necessary. Madara also expected he would be the caster of Infinite Tsukuyomi and planned everything before his real death to ensure it. Zetsu, however, had different plans and had been using all of them from the start. Despite their power, Black and White Zetsu never had sharingan eyes like Hagaromo, so they needed someone with special ones to cast Infinite Tsukuyomi for them.)

Zetsu answered the question to finally convince his masked ally:

"It would take us many years to capture the nine bijuus on our own. We can do it faster if we gather a team of the most powerful rogue ninjas and have them capture the nine jinchurikis for us (jinchurikis are the ones that have a tailed-beast sealed within; Naruto is a jinchuriki and the Sage of the Six Paths was the first one). The girl's sharingans can be useful for this task. We will have to convince our elite squad with some reward. A set of sharingans would do it for one of our members. And if these sharingans had the power to become rinnegans, we can keep them for you. Remember that when Madara is revived, you will have only one of his rinnegans; he will have the other one and will expect to get yours too. You need two rinnegans, just becoming the Ten-Tails' jinchuriki won't ensure that you can cast Infinite Tsukuyomi."

The masked Uchiha thought about it. The truth was that he trusted White Zetsu more than the other two. And what he was saying made sense; it was even convenient for him. He knew that Zetsu was capable of assessing the potential of sharingan eyes, so they would know whether those were worth something or not. It sounded like a good deal with nothing to lose.

"Let's get it out of the way then," he said with his deep voice.

"Tomorrow, Zetsu and I will go visit the girl's village. I will use my mangekyou's space-teleportation technique to get us there faster. You will stay here Spiral and clean up the mess."

Afterwards, his red sharingan engulfed him and he left the hideout in the blink of an eye. Then, Zetsu—both of them, Black and White—and Spiral went outside, but the masked guy wasn't there; he went somewhere else.

Black Zetsu could bend and travel through part of the ground when he detached himself from White Zetsu's body. He did that and ensured that the masked Uchiha wasn't anywhere close to them. White Zetsu also had ways to do the same thing using his liquid Earth clones that, like Black Zetsu, were capable of travelling through the soil.

"Spiral, you won't possess him this time, not like the time when we helped Itachi to massacre all the other Uchihas at their clan."

Spiral laughed:

"Oh yes, I remember. You two inspected every single one of them. Only 5% of them had awakened sharingans and the two that had the mangekyous were not that powerful. The two Uchihas in our team were more powerful than the ones there. However, even they were not like Madara at his best."

Black Zetsu added:

"Madara Uchiha is still our best chance to have Infinite Tsukuyomi performed to finish my master plan. Besides my brother Hagaromo, he was the only one that truly awakened the rinnegans. No one else achieved it."

Spiral and Black Zetsu didn't sound like living beings that lacked intelligence anymore. Spiral still sounded a little annoying, but he clearly was as smart as the other two. Black Zetsu was acting as the mastermind of the plan. However, White Zetsu also sounded wiser, now that he wasn't acting to make the masked Uchiha believe that he was the real boss. In addition, no one knew what White Zetsu's true plan was since he controlled Spiral and Black Zetsu could use him, but not read what he had in mind. He joined the conversation:

"We might have other alternatives for potential rinnegans, or special sharingans. Apparently, not every single Uchiha lived at their clan, so we didn't kill all of them and we haven't seen all sharingan eyes. I don't expect much though. The only sharingans I ever inspected that had potential to become rinnegans were (masked guy's name)'s and Itachi's. However, this girl might surprise us. She is a descendant of Madara after all."

White Zetsu was the best liar ever. He was hiding another fact from them that was delivered to him by one of his Earth clones that saw the village: Maida's sharingans were always in their active state. White Zetsu didn't remember anyone who had their sharingan eyes activated at all times. Even the masked Uchiha and Madara changed their eye to their normal state after they used their sharingan's power. This was already a clue that told him there could be something special about that girl's sharingans.

Black Zetsu reassured them of the plan's prosperous path up to now:

"Of course, we will consider all the options available. We saved Madara's life just as he awakened the rinnegans, after his last battle with the First Hokage. We made him believe that we were his strong will and made him envision our plan as his own. He was too weak however. We had to keep him alive through various means, until we couldn't use him to fulfill our plan, at least not in that state. Despite being dead now, he will still be our best bet for success after his full revival. Just in case something goes wrong, we already have the other two Uchihas capable of awakening the rinnegan. Our masked friend is with us and Itachi Uchiha will be recruited for our squad of rogue elites. Now, we just need to capture the jinchurikis to get the nine bijuus from them. Without the Ten-Tails, the plan cannot be finished, even if there is someone with a special sharingan that we can use."

White Zetsu grabbed Spiral's head—Spiral was looking at the sky as if he wasn't listening—and made him look back down, then he told Spiral:

"Don't do anything foolish again while we leave you here. It is good if you play the 'fool' role, but don't go overboard with it."

"Again? What did I do now?!" Spiral sounded irritated.

"When we were finishing Jounen and his men, you called me Zet, my real name. No one is supposed to know that, except us. Our allies are not supposed to know that. We are Zetsu to them and they must never know that they are pawns to fulfill our plan. And only (masked man's name) must know about your existence for now, the others must never see you. Don't forget you are still alive because of me and I can terminate you now. Do you understand?"

White Zetsu sounded quite convincing.

Spiral reassured him, but it was obvious that he was still going to be himself anyways:

"Yes, yes, yes, no more Zeee… I won't separate Zet and Su again, like it used to be," answered Spiral.

Then, Black Zetsu talked:

"I don't want to hear my name from you either. No one will be suspicious because you called us Zet, but Su won't work. Don't say it again. Understood?"

Spiral made a "yes sir" signal with his head. He had gotten the message clearly, although, at times, even a being like him was fed up from taking orders from these two all the time. It was too bad that he could not escape from what Zet did to him during their battle at his realm, one hundred years ago…

The next day, Zetsu and the masked Uchiha were ready to pay a visit to Madara's grand-daughter at her small village. They made it pretty fast thanks to the teleportation technique of the mangekyou sharingan. In less than an hour, the masked guy and Zetsu appeared at a location not too far from the village. They knew Jounen had been defeated at that village, so there had to be at least one or two skilled shinobi there, but it didn't bother them at all. Jounen was no match for them.

NEXT CHAPTER / EPISODE: Seekers of the Sharingan


	8. Chapter 8: Seekers of the Sharingan

**CHAPTER 8: Seekers of the Sharingan**

It was another usual afternoon at the village when the Uchiha of the orange mask and Zetsu arrived there:

Pedro was at the nearby mountain where he had been doing his trainings. Maida was at the medical cabins with the other nurses—she was now considered the "gifted" healer of the village. Kenn was still teaching his class. And Carl was doing gatekeeper duty with one of his students. Chief Barton was preparing papers and other things at his house for the encounter with the Third Hokage to unite his village with The Leaf's clan. The reunion was going to take place at the village in just two days.

Zetsu and his masked ally didn't do anything to cover themselves; they just walked calmly towards the entrance of the village. It didn't take long for Carl and the other guy to notice them. They asked them to identify themselves, but the two strangers didn't listen; and they definitely didn't look like good news either.

When they were close enough, Zetsu stood still.

"You can take care of them. I will watch from here."

The masked guy looked at White and Black Zetsu with a demeaning eye.

"Whatever suits you two. I will go ahead."

"Yes, watching is something that I have been doing for a long time. And we enjoy it just as much as fighting," said White and Black Zetsu while they smiled at their masked ally.

The Uchiha walked straight towards the second guard, whom quickly threw two knives at him. His red sharingan eye engulfed the knives and his body in a vortex that disappeared. This was when Carl realized that these guys were a serious threat. These unseen techniques and the fact that they didn't wear a headband of allegiance to any clan meant that they had to be high-level rogue ninjas like Jounen, or even worse.

The vortex appeared again behind the one that threw the knives; it revealed the red eye first, then the orange mask, and finally the whole body, but that wasn't all. After the masked ninja appeared behind his attacker, so did the knives that were thrown at him. They were now aimed at the guard though. By the time he turned around, he was struck by his own knives. Then, the vortex appeared once again on the guard himself and it brought an explosion that left the guard unconscious on the floor. During the dimensional teleportation technique, the masked man threw one of his own explosive shurikens, then he made himself appear first and both, his shuriken and the knives that were thrown at him appeared later in front of the guard.

Carl didn't hesitate when he saw this. He quickly launched his knife aimed at the button that activated the village's new alarm to warm others of an attack. Next, he grabbed his sword and started to attack the masked guy, but there was something wrong. His sword slashes were not landing! Two times he saw the sword go through the guy's arm as if it was air, and nothing happened! He had dodged all attacks and the ones that landed went straight through him as if he wasn't there! And indeed he wasn't.

(His sharingan's special technique was to teleport portions of the space around him to another place for a few seconds; only his sharingan could enter and exit that place. He was also capable of using the technique on himself and this was enough to give him invulnerability to attacks and jutsus for a few seconds. His image from his sharingan's place was visible, but his real self was not there during that second and that was why the attacks went through him. There was nothing there, just what he looked like at the other place.)

All of a sudden, Carl felt that he couldn't move at all. A black-looking thing was holding his legs and restraining his mobility. Black Zetsu had intervened; and White Zetsu was right there too. They were not together now.

"I thought you wanted to watch," said the masked Uchiha.

"We need to act quickly. With this loud alarm everyone knows we are here and our target may have a chance to escape," said White Zetsu, even though he knew that escape from them was very unlikely.

Then, he approached Carl:

"Where is the girl that has the sharingan eyes in your village? Her eyes look like his."

White Zetsu pointed at the masked Uchiha's visible eye. His sharingan in its normal state looked like Maida's.

Carl wasn't saying anything at all because he knew that reinforcements were on the way already. And Black Zetsu couldn't read minds like Spiral, so he couldn't get anything out of Carl either.

White Zetsu noticed that a group of armed people were coming, so he stabbed Carl with a dagger of wood that came out of his hand. Apparently, he was capable of using Spiral's techniques too.

"Things are going to get hectic here," stated White Zetsu filled with excitement.

"Let's look for the sharingan now," ordered Black Zetsu.

"Yes, but let's remain separate for now, it has been a while since I fight like this. I know you need to be connected to a body, but my clones shall work for now. I want to fight here as myself."

Then, he turned towards the masked Uchiha.

"We will enter the village and get the sharingans. Take care of this group that is coming," said White Zetsu.

Black Zetsu merged with the ground and left the scene without anyone seeing him after he entered the ground. He headed to the central part of the village.

White Zetsu prepared his special clones for the upcoming battle. He focused and used his technique:

"Solid clones jutsu!"

(Unlike Naruto's famous shadow clones, White Zetsu's solid clones are not destroyed easily. They are nowhere near as powerful or smart as their original, but they must be killed, instead of just hit or damaged for them to be gone for good. They do not disappear either; their bodies stay there, since they are solid like real bodies.)

About 30 beings that looked just like White Zetsu raised from the ground. Ten of them went to attack the group that approached them and the others walked with White Zetsu when he headed straight for the village's central fountain, which was visible from the entrance.

The group of reinforcements was Kenn's squad.

"Carl!" yelled Kenn when he saw Carl collapsing to the floor. He couldn't see who had stabbed Carl, but the two in front of him were the guy of the orange mask and one of the white green-haired freaks. It had to be one of them.

"You look like the group's leader. Tell me where in the village is the one that has sharingan eyes," demanded the masked Uchiha. However, Kenn wasn't listening. He had just realized that Carl was dead; he looked different and lifeless.

"You two will pay for this!"

Kenn had his two red knives ready, but the masked guy attacked first at that moment.

"Fire-style Katon fireball jutsu!"

Kenn counterattacked just in time!

"Fire-style Katon fireball jutsu!"

The masked Uchiha had not used his full power because he never expected that someone from this village would be able to use fire jutsus; however, his attack wasn't weak and it had been stopped completely by the same fire-based technique. It had to be… there was no other explanation:

"You are another Uchiha like me."

The masked man was a little surprised. He thought that all Uchihas were dead, except for him and Itachi's little brother, Sasuke Uchiha, who's life had been spared by Itachi during the Uchiha clan's massacre. He was one of the last ones remaining from his clan, but now they had found two in the same village, and one was even from Madara's bloodline. Things had changed.

Kenn had also realized that this guy was an Uchiha. He had an eye similar to Maida's, so he also had an awakened sharingan, but he didn't care:

"Uchiha or not, you will pay for this!

Fire-shaper jutsu!"

The power of flames encircled the top half of Kenn's fire knives and he charged at the other Uchiha. He quickly noticed that the sharingan eye had something to do with him not landing any attack, even though he had seen his knives go through the enemy more than once.

"It doesn't work. Don't you realize that you cannot hit me with any attack!?"

There was some space in-between them and both stood still for a while.

"The sharingan eye has a limit. You won't be able to use it forever. And when you reach it, your eye will bleed and you won't be able to use its power again until it is fully healed."

The masked man laughed with his deep voice.

"That is true, but it won't work with me. I am used to using it many times. You and everyone here will be goners before my sharingan reaches its limit."

Then, an unexpected barrage of shurikens and knives started to fall on the masked Uchiha. (Kenn's group had defeated the White Zetsu clones!) And he wasn't able to throw them back at them because he didn't see them coming, so he didn't have the chance to absorb them with his eye's vortex. His eye was extremely quick though; so he was able to teleport himself to avoid getting hurt. Nonetheless, at least one of the shurikens or knives did hit him. Kenn saw there was some blood on the enemy's arm. How was that possible if he had been using his eye technique?

Kenn figured it out pretty quickly. His technique needed at least half a second of recovery before it could be used again for another five seconds. Then, if attacks were coming nonstop, it was possible to hit him during that minimal time of recovery. Not all of them threw their shurikens at once—he had taught them this as a group battle tactic—they timed it so that shurikens and knives were falling on the target nonstop for a while.

Kenn's group surrounded the masked Uchiha and, when they saw Kenn's signal, they prepared to attack him just like before, but using the fire-style jutsu that Kenn had taught them well. Some of them began to use the Katon Blaze jutsu and the others followed with perfect timing. Their blazes were nowhere near as powerful as those done by the Uchihas—who are well-known for their eye techniques and their mastery of fire-based jutsus—but they were enough to cause burns.

The masked man thought about beating them all at once with his more powerful fire jutsus, but they were not close together; they were attacking from different places around him. Also, these were not shurikens, it was fire, so he couldn't absorb the attack with his sharingan and throw it back at them. (If he had a rinnegan this was possible. One of the rinnegan's abilities is to absorb and nullify all elemental jutsus.) He also realized that some of the blazes were capable of reaching him during his minimal time of recovery. Then, he thought he would have to take them out one by one, teleporting around the place until they were all gone. However, a better idea to show how mighty he was came to his mind.

The masked man teleported himself to the roof of the tallest house at the front of the village before any of the blazes reached him. From there, Kenn's whole group was visible. They would know what the ultimate fire-style technique was like and he would take them all out in one shot.

"Fire-style Katon Inferno jutsu!"

The Uchiha of the orange mask created an unbelievably large mass of fire that moved very quickly and became even larger. It covered the whole area where Kenn and the others were. It also reached the entrance of the village and started a fire.

He was certain that it was over, at least for this group.

"What a pity. He could have joined me instead of ending up like this here. He had not even awakened his sharingan."

However, he had been wrong all along, may be because he also had a little of the same type of arrogance that Jounen had.

Heat shields that looked like orange bubbles were covering everyone. Some villagers had fallen, but almost everyone in Kenn's group was still there. And Kenn was looking at him with the new look of his red sharingan eyes. He had awakened his eyes during the last month of trainings and had perfected his heat shield, which was far stronger than before now. He was the one that casted it on all. He was forced to activate his sharingan to make his best shields against fire itself.

The masked Uchiha was angry now. He was starting to feel fatigued from using his eye and from the last large-scale jutsu, but he would never lose to the likes of Kenn or to anyone—at least, that's what he thought. He had to fulfill Madara's plan and his dream first. He turned to look at the village itself, while his sharingan eye changed to its mangekyou shape:

"Fire-style Katon Rain jutsu!"

A large number of small balls of fire started to fall on the houses of the village, causing many fires. Then, the masked man turned back to look at Kenn. He was going to use his most lethal technique with his mangekyou sharingan. It consisted on using his teleportation on parts of others' bodies, causing them fatal injuries that were guaranteed to kill them in one single shot. Before he began, however, he realized that half of Kenn's group were almost kids and there were kids in the village near the entrance. He stopped to think for a second. He would kill the other Uchiha without hesitation, but not the kids. The reality was that he wasn't as evil and merciless as he looked. He also started to feel the fatigue again, so he had to hurry.

Suddenly, he felt there was someone else there with him.

"Do you need a hand with this? It will be just like when I helped you to break the cave's wall back then."

The voice was familiar, but different. Nonetheless, he was able to recognize it before turning around.

"Spiral? What are you doing here!?"

"Yes, you do need my help. I am the ultimate living armor after all."

Before the masked Uchiha could turn completely, Spiral united his arms and legs with his and closed his face and his head on his. By the time the masked Uchiha began to see what happened, it was already too late. Spiral was already in control and he would be until Zetsu ordered him to let him go. Spiral looked like a snake when he covered the masked guy's whole body with his own.

Spiral's main concern was eliminating all the obstacles to Zetsu's examination of the sharingans. Those who had sharingans could not be killed before Zetsu examined them. And now there was another sharingan to check—Kenn's. This was why Spiral stopped his ally before he could use his technique to finish Kenn. However, he didn't care about the others. Spiral's wild trees and snake-like branches started to grow from the ground and began to grab everyone, regardless of age. The abnormal plants drained the chakra of everyone and left them trapped and lifeless.

Spiral used the sharingan to teleport himself—he was controlling the masked man. He appeared in front of Kenn. The branches that reached Kenn only left him trapped, but they didn't drain his life force.

"He doesn't look particularly powerful like Madara, but neither did this guy at first and now I have to admit his mangekyou's power is pretty sweet. He has come a long way."

One of White Zetsu's clones appeared from the ground to check what was happening there.

"Didn't I tell you to wait for this! We are not dealing with his former naive self now. He will be at Madara's level very soon, once he gets Madara's left rinnegan."

Spiral answered aggravated:

"He was about to kill this other Uchiha that has sharingans too. I had to stop him!"

The clone walked towards Kenn and placed his hands on Kenn's eyes. Kenn struggled and screamed as the white hands started to merge with his eyes. Then, the clones' eyes changed; they took the exact same shape and form as Kenn's sharingan eyes. They had become an exact copy of Kenn's eyes. The clone activated them and used them to feel their true potential. Then, the examination was complete and clear.

"These won't ever turn into rinnegans. Their power is limited, unlike Madara's. The farthest these can go is a mangekyou awakening, but even that is not guaranteed."

Spiral looked at Kenn.

"It's too bad. We have no use for you then."

The branches that grabbed him started to drain all his chakra, and with it, his body's life force as well. Kenn died there.

"Spiral, you will need to erase all of this from his mind without fail. After Madara, he is one of our best options. Stay in the sidelines with the other clones. We will take care of the rest while the original Zetsu gets the girl. We found out her name already."

The clone went back into the ground after his eyes turned back to their original form. Spiral entered the village.

White and Black Zetsu were already inside. There were more clones of White Zetsu there fighting the villagers.

It was only a matter of time before they could get to the one that had potential in her eyes.

NEXT CHAPTER / EPISODE: Maida's Sharingans


	9. Chapter 9: Maida's Sharingans

**CHAPTER 9: Maida's Sharingans**

Pedro realized that there were various traces of smoke in the air, and all of them were coming from where the village was. Clearly, something was happening there and if it caused that much smoke, it involved fire. It could not be anything good; that was obvious to him. Were they under attack? May be Jounen had returned with a larger group. He started to worry about Maida when he thought about that. She was their main target back then.

He was about to start his training for the day, but after the realization of danger, he knew he had to go back right away. He quickly grabbed his sword and rushed towards the village. He was wearing a black headband, a black shirt, and orange training pants. Despite his speed and his concern for what was happening, it was going to take him some time to return to the village; he was two miles away.

While he ran, he kept thinking about it. He thought about worse scenarios, such as an all-out attack from The Leaf's Anbu squads. This was a possibility if The Leaf was not a good clan as he thought. He prepared himself on the way to deal with the worst case scenario. One thing was certain: another high-level ninja had to be involved and another serious battle was going to occur once he arrived.

Meanwhile, the White Zetsu clones had caused havoc at the village looking for Madara's grand-daughter. The villagers were fighting them too. People had chosen to fight against them, instead of giving them what they wanted. However, things were starting to look bad and some had already revealed that she was in the medical area. Others called her Maida, giving up what her name was to White Zetsu.

Black Zetsu was also using his ability of going through surfaces to search houses, but he wasn't at the medical area, so he had not found anyone with sharingan eyes yet. He couldn't do this for too long either, he had to look for a clone or a villager because his life force started to fade slowly when he stayed unattached to a living body for too long. This had been his curse since that fateful day when both Zet and he had no choice, but to become what they were today.

Chief Barton was already aware of the chaos. He could feel and see some of what was happening. His mother was a woman from the Uchiha clan, a former deserter, just like Maida's mother, her daughter, and Kenn. He did not inherit the sharingan eyes and he never talked about this, so very few knew about it, but this was the real reason why he had accepted them and why he excluded them from their report to The Leaf—the Uchiha clan was a close ally of The Leaf and they had left that clan. Although his mother and Maida's mother had been gone for years, Maida reminded him of them. Unlike people like Madara, they had done much good to others.

The new invaders were destroying his village, killing his people, and now they were headed for Maida. He would not let them harm her! She was like family to him. He was old and didn't have the sharingan, but thanks to being part Uchiha he could use some of their techniques and, just like Maida, he could feel what others were thinking. Besides, he had been a really good shinobi in his youth, so he was no push over in battle either. He grabbed his crossbow and his two canes—which were really swords in disguise within the canes—and headed for the medical zone of the village.

White Zetsu was already there. He could not wait to see the one that carried Madara's blood and the sharingans that were always active. He knew those eyes had to be special because not even Madara Uchiha had his sharingans active at all times.

He stood at the very center of the plaza, where all the medical cabins and houses were. This was the same place where Pedro and Maida had met months ago.

"Maida Uchiha! Come to meet me and we won't harm this village any longer! If you don't come, everything will be destroyed until we get to you!"

Maida knew what was happening; she could see it even more clear than the chief because of her sharingans. She knew that the one leading the attack was there and it was her who he wanted from the start. She couldn't see his thoughts very clearly, but what was happening was more than enough to understand them. She headed for the door to go to the open plaza to meet him. However, the old nurse in charge of the place and two others stopped her.

"Don't go Maida," said the old woman while she held one of Maida's arms.

"If you go, they will kill you!" said the other two young nurses that blocked her way.

"What about everybody else? They will continue until they get to me, and I know what they want."

Maida was worried, but it was not about herself. The other people and what could happen to them worried her more. Maida's mind was already made up about it, but before she could leave, one of the other nurses there stood up and went to the door.

"I will tell them where you are. We should not have to die and pay because of you!"

When Yania said this, she sounded angry and full of hatred. She had been hiding the jealousy and envy that she felt towards Maida for a long time; and truth be told, this was not about saving the others, but rather about settling her own personal grudges with Maida.

She was the young nurse that took care of Pedro before he picked Maida—instead of her—to help with his recovery. Maida was considered one of the top nurses in a matter of weeks because of her special skills. Yania perceived that she deserved such distinctions too because she had been there longer. Most importantly, she never got over the fact that Pedro preferred Maida, even though she was much more attractive than Maida. And, naturally, Yania was not an angel either—deep down, she saw this as an opportunity to eliminate Maida, the one she saw as the source of her hatred.

"Yania, what are you doing!?" yelled the old nurse, but it didn't have any effect.

Yania went outside and told the green-haired invader what he wanted:

"The Uchiha woman that you seek is here in this cabin. They are hiding her! Take her and leave us in peace!"

She said it while pointing towards the right place and looking straight at White Zetsu.

White Zetsu couldn't contain his emotion, he couldn't wait any longer to get his hands on the special sharingans that could end up being just like Madara's, or better. This was a chance to fulfill the plan without Madara Uchiha.

In front of the door, there was someone already. Even though it was a little far, the red glow of her eyes made it clear that she was the one that he was looking for.

Zet—this is White Zetsu's real name—started to walk and made his move really fast:

"Earth-bullet jutsu!"

(This jutsu is a combination of Jounen's wind-twirler and Pedro's earth-shoot. It adds mad spinning to the small earth spire that is aimed at the target.)

The sharp piece of rock that Zet used pierced through Yania's heart like a bullet from a real rifle. She didn't even know that Maida was already outside and definitely didn't expect something like this. Maida ran towards her and grabbed her from the floor to attempt to save her, but it was too late for that. Even her advanced medical ninja skills were not capable of saving Yania from this. She would only live one minute more at most.

Maida started to feel desperation and some anger towards Zet, even though this was not her nature. He, his allies, and his clones had brought total chaos and despair to the whole village in less than one hour.

"I killed someone that wanted to betray you. I'm sure that your eyes had already seen that. I'm sure that you also know why I am here now."

Zet was trying to sound friendly, even though his intentions were clear. Maida left it clear that she knew what his true intentions were:

"You want my sharingans. You think that they are like my grandfather's."

Zet was a little surprised at first:

"Oh my, you really know a lot, don't you? Your eyes must be pretty good indeed."

He summoned some of his White Zetsu clones and in only a matter of seconds, two appeared from the ground close to Maida and two others appeared close to him. The two that were close to Maida grabbed her arms and pushed her forward while they walked towards their creator, Zet.

The clones were close when, suddenly, they felt their arms were burning and had to set Maida free. She was the one that had done it. She grabbed their arms and used one of the medical ninja's forbidden techniques: anti-healing. Instead of curing their wounds, she created wounds on them.

Zet was not expecting this, but he wasn't worried; if this was her way to attack instead of the sharingan's power, then she surely had not learned any powerful techniques with her eyes yet. Things were going to be easier than he expected. Even he would have had to go all out in a serious battle with someone like Madara, but she wasn't at that level.

She attacked the clones again like that, but this time they were prepared to retaliate. Both grabbed her with one hand and had a wood knife grow on the palm of their other hand. They placed the knives on her neck and forced her to keep walking.

Then, a big surprised happened to the White Zetsu clones. A small arrow pierced the head of one of them and the other one got another arrow on the neck. Both fell down to the ground and stayed there. Chief Barton had arrived on the scene.

Another clone came from the ground and held Barton's crossbow while the two that were with Zet ran towards him. When they were close, Barton grabbed the two canes he was holding with his other hand and unsheathed the two medium-sized swords—revealing that they really were not canes for an old man after all. A few sword slashes were enough to deal with the clones that had no weapons or armor to protect them.

"I won't let you destroy my village and my family any longer!"

Barton grabbed the crossbow and shot an arrow straight at Zet's face.

The arrow was so fast that Zet really didn't have time to do any of his jutsus to block it, neither could he grow a shield of trees like Spiral. He only had time to move his head out of the way, and it almost caught him! He got really mad when he realized it had given him a small cut on his left cheek. He had not been able to dodge it! (The old man certainly had crossbow skills)

Zet touched the ground and made wild branches—like Spiral's—grow close to Maida and Barton. Both were caught and trapped by the branches. He also made another batch of White Zetsu clones with his solid clones jutsu to block any villagers that were coming to help Maida and the chief.

Su—Black Zetsu's real name—and Spiral—who was on the masked Uchiha's body—arrived at the scene, but they stayed a little far to fight off any villagers that tried to get closer to the chief or to Maida. Su took over one of the clones; he was already starting to feel a little weak from not being attached to any living body since they started the assault at the village. He preferred a powerful one like his nephew's—Su was Zet's uncle and Hagaromo's second brother—but he had to allow Zet to examine the sharingans. Neither he nor Spiral had that ability.

Zet's face-cut healed abnormally fast, but his pride didn't. He went towards Barton first and stood still when he was in front of him. The chief was firm, despite the imminent danger.

"You monster! You won't get what you want from us!"

"I will, starting with you. Because of your defiance old man, I will give you a slower death."

Zet made a wood knife on his hand and used it to deliver a lethal stab to Barton. It wasn't at a vital point, but close enough to one, so Barton was not going to make it if he didn't get medical attention soon. Then, Zet made the branches go back to the ground and Barton fell on the floor.

"With that wound, you will live another hour at most, and you will see me get what I came here for."

He left Barton there and headed towards Maida. She attempted to use genjutsu on him, even though she didn't have formal practice on such sharingan techniques.

(Genjutsu is the type of special ninja techniques that can be used to cloud or change the perception of reality that the attacker has. In Naruto's world, those with eye powers can do genjutsu and the Uchihas are the best users of it by far.)

"You don't know your genjutsu very well, but even if you did, it won't work on me. That was one of the useful things I learned from my trip out of the human realm. Now, let's see what you have for me Maida Uchiha."

Zet placed the palms of his hands on her eyes, just like his clone had done with Kenn before. Maida struggled as she felt that his palms were merging with her eyes, but she couldn't escape the branches. Then, it finally happened: Zet's eyes took the same form as Maida's sharingans.

He had random visions of past events. He saw himself as a kid and as a teenager, years before he was cursed as Zetsu. He remembered how he was the only one of Hagaromo's children that wasn't recognized as powerful in the human realm. His half-brothers, Asura and Indra, and his father, the Sage of the Six Paths, always had all the praise. He saw how he became a powerful sage at the other realms. He also remembered the grand battle where both he and his uncle Su lost it all and ended up as Zetsu. Someday—after he dominated the human realm—he would get revenge on the one that had done that to him, and on Su as well, for using him during such a long time. Finally, he saw something that wasn't from his past; it was a battle where both, him and some unknown shinobi—who's face wasn't clear—were present. The unknown shinobi was dressed as a sage from one of the other realms…

He had enough of this! Apparently, this was the power of Maida's sharingans. She could "see" things. He tried to use the sharingans for genjutsu and even tried to force them into a mangekyou transformation, but it was futile. After straining himself very much trying to draw out the power of Maida's sharingans and judging how much they would be able to evolve, it became clear to him: He didn't feel that her sharingans would ever turn into rinnegans and they didn't feel anywhere near as powerful as Madara's.

Zet was extremely disappointed. He was expecting something special from the fact that they were always active, but all he got was a series of flashbacks. Even worse, he was certain that these would never turn into rinnegans, so they didn't work for the plan. They had gone through all the trouble at the village for nothing.

He finally detached his hands from her eyes and his eyes came back to their normal color.

"It is too bad that you are Madara's grand-daughter. You are nothing like him. His sharingans were a hundred times more powerful than these eyes you have. Even at his death bed, he was able to awaken the rinnegan. It looks like we will need his eyes to complete our plan."

His disappointment started to turn into anger slowly. And the branches began to drain Maida's life force. He stopped them before it could kill her and made them come back to the ground after he had his left hand on her neck. He lifted her with that hand only. His voice was piercing:

"A grand-daughter that he apparently didn't know about won't be one that he will miss. Besides, after he summons Infinite Tsukuyomi for us, we will also take him out. It must have been a curse being from his bloodline, just like it was for me to be the forgotten son of the great sage. I will free you from that. Good bye Maida Uchiha."

Even though she was in critical condition, Zet wanted to deliver the finishing blow himself. (Deep down, he despised both his father and Madara because they had been chosen to have the rinnegan, rather than him.) His right hand approached Maida, while a final wood knife grew on its palm. He was going to use that knife on Maida right when it happened:

Three sharp spires of earth lacerated his two arms when they went through them at high speeds. He had to drop Maida right away. His arms were in a really bad shape in an instant.

The one who did it had to be a pretty skilled earth-style ninja. Even Zet never used more than two spires at a time for that technique. He looked at the distance, and so did Su. They saw someone there with a sword, a black t-shirt, and orange pants.

The village's earth-ninja had arrived!

NEXT CHAPTER / EPISODE: Pedro Namikaze Versus Zetsu


	10. Chapter 10: Pedro Namikaze Versus Zetsu

**CHAPTER 10: Pedro Namikaze Versus Zetsu**

Pedro arrived and got quite alarmed with what he saw. There were fires and battles with white green-haired clones throughout the entire village. At the large medical plaza, he noticed a strange masked man and a black being—that didn't seem human—were blocking a group of villagers from entering the plaza. Then, he saw the one that looked like the original green-haired one and the leader of all. He was at the center of the plaza lifting someone with one hand only.

Pedro's examination of the situation and even his thoughts stopped altogether when he realized that the leader was about to kill Maida. He attacked instantly and as fast as he could with his fastest attack: the earth-shoot jutsu. His jutsu left Zet's arms in really bad shape.

Zet looked at him and started to heal himself with a special medical ninjutsu. The green glow on his hands looked exactly like that of Maida when she used her most powerful healing technique before. However, Zet's healing speed was much faster. Something else was happening with him; his healing was abnormally fast.

"Stop any villagers from interfering with us Spiral. It looks like Zet was caught off guard. I will take care of this guy quickly," said Black Zetsu (Su).

Su got closer to Zet and to Pedro.

"It's him. He is the one that defeated Jounen before, I can feel it," said White Zetsu (Zet).

Su had no worries at all:

"It doesn't matter to us. I will finish him even faster than Jounen."

Zet, however, was very good at judging other ninjas' level and abilities. Somehow, he knew that this one was not going to be a walk in the park. He finished healing his arms, while Su headed straight for Pedro. Pedro had just untied and dropped his black headband. It was clear that to stop the attack on the village, he had to defeat "White" and "Black." They were the leaders. Most importantly, they were after Maida, so to guarantee her safety, they had to be defeated. And Maida was in a very bad condition, so this was a battle against the clock as well. He had to finish them quickly to save her.

Su planned to grab him and immobilize him with his body control power; however, he didn't know the earth ninja was quite clever against new opponents.

"Earth-grab jutsu!"

Pedro's jutsu grabbed a very large portion of earth and threw it at Su at the right time. This blocked Su's sight of him for a few seconds and delayed Su's attack. Black Zetsu even got earth on his mouth from that jutsu, so he got furious:

"You worm! How dare you!"

Then, he saw the earth ninja approaching in the air, right after the earth-grab attack ended, and ready to slash him with his sword. Su extended his arm and got a hold of him, then he shaped his other hand like a spear and made it go right through him. And, as if all that wasn't enough, he made a wild branch—like Spiral and Zet's branches—grow from behind and it impaled the earh ninja as well.

"It's over in less than one minute," said Su triumphant.

However, the earth ninja he had finished turned into actual earth that simply crumbled on his hands. It was an earth clone, which was a simple type of jutsu used to distract opponents. Even kids could do it. And he fell for it completely!

While Su's hands were still in the earth clone's remains, Pedro appeared and, with a swift and mighty slash of his sword, he cut Su's body in half!

Su could not have gotten a bigger surprise, but he also reacted very quickly: he detached himself from the White Zetsu clone and jumped in the air, revealing his true form—a black living mass of variable shape that was taking a human shape for now. However, it wasn't over yet.

When the real Black Zetsu turned around to look for Pedro, a giant earth sword clashed on his head! And, without leaving him a second to recover, Pedro cut him in half again! This time it was through his head; the White Zetsu clone had been split through the stomach area.

Pedro had used his earth-shaper jutsu, which was far better than before. And, knowing that this was the real one, he didn't think twice to follow with another slash. Su wouldn't have seen this coming, even in his dreams.

Spiral was in shock:

"Su! I mean… Black Zetsu!"

He was ready to cast the Inferno jutsu and go all out on the earth ninja, but Zet stopped him:

"Relax, and do not interfere, no matter what! Stop the villagers left and leave this arena to me. Black Zetsu may be in trouble, but that won't kill him. You, better than anyone, should know that by now. He is different from us."

Zet knew this could have been an opportunity to finish Su, but he was more driven to have a good battle being the master of his body like before. Besides, the earth ninja was fast, so he really had no other choice than dealing with him first.

"But, how is this village ninja so powerful?! I haven't seen anyone beat Black Zetsu so fast!"

Spiral was still shocked, and also anxious about not joining Zet. Zet, however, had a full grasp of the situation already:

"He has one or two open chakra gates; and he is fast and clever. Those are his secrets. Nothing I have not seen before."

Zet forced Spiral to obey and summoned more of his clones:

"Snake-curse jutsu!"

"Solid clones jutsu!"

After just a minor feel of the horrible curse that bound him to Zet since that fateful day, Spiral obeyed Zet right away.

Zet closed his eyes and prepared himself to fight just as he used to do it before he was cursed that day as White Zetsu.

He sent the clones after Pedro and began to gather nature's energy (also known as sage chakra in Naruto Shippuden) to enter one of his sage modes. He knew the earth ninja could last a good amount of time with his chakra gates, so he chose to fight him with an equivalent force: sage mode.

(Sage mode gathers sage chakra from nature, instead of inner chakra from the body. After enough sage chakra is gathered, the user can enter sage mode, which—just like the "open body gates" mode—increases speed, jutsu power, and strength dramatically. It also wears off after a limited amount of time. However, it doesn't hurt the user's body after it ends, and it allows the use of a realm's unique sage abilities and jutsus—if the user turns into the sage mode of that realm.)

This was a grand joy for Zet. It had been decades since he fought a worthy opponent without Su attached to him and controlling him for half of the battle. It had also been a long time since his last use of a sage mode.

"The other medium-level ninjas at the village were only a warm-up for me. I am glad that you came at the end earth ninja. Let me show you what a true master of the earth-style can do."

Pedro finished dealing with the clones while he heard Zet's words. He knew he could have his first chakra gate open for another 20 minutes, and he could even open the second one, but that would cut his time limit to eight minutes at most.

Zet still had his eyes closed, but by the time the clones were finished, he had already reached sage mode: the perimeter of his eyes and the skin of his face around them turned brown; his pupils also changed from yellow to light brown; and, at the end, a straight purple line appeared on the center of his forehead with another purple diamond shape at its center. He was ready.

Pedro attacked him with the earth-shoot jutsu and followed with the earth-clam jutsu.

Zet destroyed the two small earth projectiles with a single punch! However, the two walls of earth that were raised by his sides clashed on him, like a giant open mouth, and closed on him without mercy!

"Earth-style sphere-shield jutsu!"

The walls broke and the rocks and earth went flying in all directions after Zet broke his own spherical earth shield. This was not a normal earh shield like Pedro's. It was capable of holding a mighty attack and then it destroyed the walls of the other attack with its release. It was a more advanced form of the technique that made it a powerful counterattack as well.

"Earth-shaper jutsu!"

Pedro made the same giant earth sword as before and launched it towards Zet like a lance that packed the power of one hundred lances.

"Grand-earth-wall jutsu!"

Zet raised a powerful wall of stone, which was clearly stronger than Pedro's at the time of his battle versus Jounen. The wall blocked the mighty sword, which couldn't go through it nor destroy it.

"Earth-sage-art plateau shaper jutsu!"

Suddenly, the portion of the ground where Zet was standing began to raise up more and more, and the area surrounding Zet also went up until a small mountain was formed. This earth-style jutsu was completely new to Pedro; he had never seen anything like it done by anyone in his whole life.

Then, the bodies of Maida and Barton began to roll down from the middle of the elevated terrain from the side that was farthest from Pedro. Both were alive, but in critical condition. They would not make it without fast medical attention. Pedro almost forgot about his dire situation and went towards them to help them, but Zet was just getting started:

"They should be your last concern now! Your own life is what you should be fighting for! I haven't shown you what an earth sage from the Earth Realm can do! Watch!"

Zet prepared himself for a major sage jutsu:

"Earth-sage-art earthquake jutsu!"

The land around everyone at the village began to tremble. Everyone had to stand still and most tall structures were destroyed. Even Spiral remembered what it was like to fight Sage Zet at his full power when they had their grand battle at the realm from where Spiral came from.

Despite the quake, Pedro managed to get closer to Barton and Maida. They were indeed alive, but in a worse condition than he thought—especially chief Barton. His eyes caught Maida's for a second and both could see the deep worry in their souls for the well-being of the other. They were more worried about their loved one than about themselves.

Then, Zet focused on another major attack of the Earth Realm's sages, and he aimed it at Pedro:

"Earth-sage-art earth storm!"

It looked just like Jounen's tornado, but it was larger and it also gathered rocks and earth nonstop throughout its path. It was a true force of nature: a calamity of earth and wind combined!

Pedro was capable of dodging it thanks to the speed he had with his open chakra gate, but he could not do it. Maida and Barton were going to get hit by it! He could not dodge knowing that they were behind him. All three of them were going to get hit by it if he could not block it!

He used the most powerful earth wall that he could make and then, he opened his second chakra gate and made earth-sphere-shields for Maida, Barton, and himself.

The wall started to crack and the earth tornado didn't seem to get any weaker. It was clear that it was going to break completely before it was over. Pedro didn't know what to do this time, but he followed his heart. He stood a few meters in front of them to block it from getting to them. It was already too late to escape it. It would have had to go through him first to reach them.

Maida was almost in tears:

"Pedro don't do it! Please escape! Leave us!"

She didn't want to see anything bad happening to Pedro and she could barely move after what the branches had done to her. Nonetheless, she managed to be loud enough so that Pedro could hear her.

As he watched how his wall of earth shattered, he gave her his answer:

"I won't leave you! I will never leave the ones I love behind!"

It only lasted for another half a minute, so it didn't reach Maida or Barton, but that was enough to break Pedro's shield and he suffered wounds. Thankfully, his clothes guarded him, but he wasn't in good condition anymore.

"It is time to finish things here earth ninja. Why don't you tell me your name now?"

Zet sounded like someone who had complete control of the situation.

Pedro prepared himself for what he was about to do—his last resort to beat this uber powerful rogue ninja. Purposefully, he answered Zet to gain some time for himself:

"I am Pedro Namikaze from the former Namikaze clan."

"Namikaze? I don't remember them. They must have been a bunch of random earth ninjas, but nothing extraordinary and definitely no candidates for sages among them."

Zet was already convinced of how this battle would end:

"You would have made a good earth sage at the land of those stupid monkeys from the Earth Realm. It is too bad that your journey will end here."

Pedro was almost ready. He began to run towards Zet to get as far as possible from Maida and Barton.

Then, Zet revealed his final attack:

"This is how you do the earth shaper jutsu!"

"Earth-sage-art shaper jutsu!"

Zet formed one hundred and twenty earth swords of standard shape. Clearly, he planned to launch them all at Pedro; and he did it.

Pedro simultaneously opened two more of his body's chakra gates, making it four in total. He had already opened two and three during his training, but this was his first time ever with four. He knew it would take a single minute to reach his limit.

The power and the chakra from the four gates—half of the body's chakra gates—open at once was unbelievable. His speed doubled and he was already quite fast with two gates open. He blocked or destroyed each of the dozens of earth swords with his own sword.

Zet quickly realized what happened to Pedro. This was a real problem. The strength and speed he had gained almost matched his sage mode, and both his sage mode and Pedro's chakra flow were at their limits. The tables could be turned against his favor. He quickly thought of a finisher to end things right away, but he had no time, he was already within Pedro's reach.

Zet created and used a solid earth sword against Pedro's normal sword. However, Zet overestimated his own skills. It had been ages since he fought using swords in close-range battle.

Pedro managed to land three serious slashes on him. They were at very similar speeds even though his sage mode was supposed to be a little faster. Then, Zet's purple diamond on his forehead began to glow and his major wounds began to close and heal really fast.

"I forgot to tell you my secret: I am not just an earth sage. I got my healing powers from the Slug Realm's sage mode, which I am also using now."

They stood up in the center of the plaza in front of each other. This was Pedro's final chance:

"Earth-hold jutsu!"

Two large mounds of earth came up from the ground close to Pedro's hands.

Zet smiled.

"Is this your last move? Do you think you can beat be by throwing those at me? Why don't you try it!?"

Pedro threw the two mounds at him, but there was more. Zet underestimated the attack because he knew this was Pedro's last attack, so he didn't cover himself with any shields or walls. However, he missed that an earth sword was going for his head from behind. Pedro also rushed towards him.

Zet perceived the sword from behind without seeing it—thanks to his training at the Snake Realm—so he blocked that; but when he did it, Pedro reached for one of the mounds and grabbed his own real sword, which was hidden inside it. He directed his last sword slash at Zet's head too. Pedro's final slash was his most powerful; it would have broken a rock in half.

Zet couldn't block both and since he chose to block the one from behind, Pedro's sword was going to get him for sure. There was no time to escape the final sword slash. For the first time in years, Zet realized that someone had been able to outsmart him in a fraction of a battle. He was going to lose his life because of a minor little mistake he made in judging someone who wasn't at his sage level.

However, fate didn't intend it to be that way. Su saved Zet just in time by grabbing Pedro and slightly moving his sword's trajectory before his attack reached Zet's head. Apparently, being split in half before had not killed Su.

At that moment, Pedro's chakra flow reached its limit.

Zet reached for him, still in shock because Pedro's sword almost touched him with enough power to go through him—even in his stronger sage modes—and he was not quite like Su, so that could have been his end. For a second, Zet felt a glimpse of fear for his life; it had been ages since he had had a taste of that feeling. He was a superior being from the past: the third son of the legendary Sage of Six Paths who created and spread the power of jutsus in the Human Realm; the one who found the secret to travelling to another realm when no one knew it; a genius who had become powerful without the help of eye powers or his father; and the one who conquered the secrets of all the other realms, except Mount Myoboku (the Realm of the Toads)—he didn't think stupid frogs would add much more to his power.

The thought that someone like this earth ninja could have finished him was unbearable. His grand dream of leading the Human Realm and taking revenge on his uncle and the one whom cursed them both could not be stopped by anyone. After these thoughts, he punched Pedro on his left eye. Then, Zet's sage mode power reached its limit. His eyes and forehead returned to normal.

The punch pretty much destroyed Pedro's left eye. Zet was still an earth sage when he did it. The punch and the aftermath of opening four chakra gates for the first time hit Pedro at the same time, so he lost consciousness.

Su attached himself to Zet's body again.

"What would you do without me nephew?" asked Su sarcastically.

Zet, by his own will, prepared a wood knife to kill Pedro, but when he was about to do it, he stopped:

"I have to admit you were pretty good. What was your name? I forgot it. Anyways, you earned it earth ninja. For giving me a great battle, even at your level, I will give you a painless death. And I will take back what I said: there was one at your unknown clan who could have been a sage. It's too bad you are an enemy, otherwise we could have recruited you for our elite group, Akatsuki."

Zetsu made a bunch of branches grab Pedro and place him on the ground. The branches began to suck away his life force.

"Spiral, we are leaving, there is nothing left at this village now. Do the clean-up for us, as you always do. Remember, no witnesses. Finish any survivors you find."

When Barton heard that, he knew he had to do it; he knew he had to use the forbidden genjutsu that his Uchiha mother had taught him, the one that could feign a person's death and that didn't require the sharingan eyes. He used it on Maida, but Spiral reached him before he could use it on himself. Spiral didn't recognize that Maida was not dead because of that temporary genjutsu.

Afterwards, Zetsu—Zet and Su—and Spiral (who still had hold of the masked man's body) left.

The whole village had been destroyed and everyone was dead, except for Maida.

Pedro Namizake's body was on the bed of branches where Zet had left him. He was dead too, along with his dreams and hopes of creating peace and happiness in his war-torn ninja world.

NEXT CHAPTER / EPISODE: The Sacrifice


	11. Chapter 11: The Sacrifice

**CHAPTER 11: The Sacrifice**

Maida could feel that the invaders were gone. There were fires in the village still, but they were not at the plaza where the last events occurred. She saw one of the invaders attacking Barton, but he had left her there, as if he thought that she was dead.

It worried her that there was no movement after they left. There were no voices and no one was coming to help her or the others. However, Pedro was her main concern at that moment. He definitely wasn't in a good condition. She had to help him. She still had in her mind what he did for her and Barton. She couldn't let him die no matter what.

She tried to stand on her feet, but she couldn't. Her condition was comparable to being two days without food, not to mention that she also had wounds from when Zet raised his earth hill and Barton and she fell down from it. She needed medical attention, but that was her last concern.

When she managed to crawl to move from where she was, she was able to see the destruction that lied ahead. No one was standing. Apparently, everyone was dead. Her red eyes got wet and she felt anguish. She thought that her sharingans were the culprits of this tragedy. If she had not been there, then may be none of that would have happened and everyone at the village would be alive.

Then, she spotted someone lying on a bunch of branches on the ground at the center of the plaza. It was Pedro!

She wasn't very close to him, but she began to move little by little, and she started to get closer and closer to him. She saw chief Barton, but there was nothing she could do for him; he was already dead. She was certain that this was not going to be the case for Pedro though. She could feel it, and her intuition, just like the visions of her sharingan eyes, were rarely wrong.

She could still remember it, despite all the devastation around them. This was the place where they had met, surrounded by the beautiful melody that she was playing. That day was when she realized that there were people capable of overlooking her eyes and seeing her for who she really was. With him, she finally understood what true love was about. He had been a blessing not just for her, but for the entire village.

She also shared his belief of joining forces with The Leaf so that all of them could help a greater cause. Becoming a part of the large clan that believed in the importance of achieving peace for its people, and for their world, would lead them and the future generations towards a better path, without wars and conflicts.

She could not believe that he was dead.

However, when she finally crawled up the branches that held his body, she could see, for the first time, that there was no life in him. This was a difficult moment for her: the truth wasn't sinking in easily in her mind.

Despite her condition, she was able to use one of her anti-healing jutsus to open the branches that held his arms and his legs. She used healing, but there was no use for it since he wasn't alive. She was not giving up though.

It was very painful to see how his left eye had been crushed—there was no healing jutsu capable of saving it. And it was even worse to realize that he and the great things he had in mind were gone. She had to do something for him; anything else was unacceptable in her mind.

"I won't leave you behind. I can't leave the one who loved me, and the one I love, behind. I can't let your dreams die," said Maida, while she held his body in her arms.

She began to remember him and what he did with her eyes still open.

As the memories continued, her sharingans began to get brighter and more red. The intensity of her eyes was greater than it had ever been. Then, it happened: the three black commas in her red eyes went towards the pupils and joined them. Her pupils were enlarged for a while and when they returned to their normal shape, the commas came back, but they looked different, they looked like infinity signs. In each eye, the three infinity signs joined around the pupil, forming a triangular shape with the pupil at the center.

Maida experienced the awakening of her mangekyou sharingan.

It was unlike any other. And, even though the movement of her triangular formation resembled Madara's, the final mangekyou shape of her sharingans was nothing like his.

Her mangekyou stayed active at all times, just like her original sharingan. Her eyes were more powerful now and she felt a resurgence of chakra through her body, but her only concern was saving Pedro somehow.

First, she did the unthinkable; she used the difficult technique that was used by high-level medical ninjas to make organ transplants. She cured the damaged skin around Pedro's left eye. Then, she replaced it with one of her mangekyou sharingans!

It seemed as if she had come back to life herself after the awakening of the mangekyou. Suddenly, she had chakra and strength to do all these high-level techniques.

She focused on him with her other eye and forgot everything else. She continued seeing her memories of him until she reached the current moment, but she didn't want them to end there, so the memories continued into the future, as if Pedro Namikaze had not died there. She saw many things, and chose to keep going, even though her own memories were starting to fade as she continued extending his.

She knew what was going to happen then. This was the special power of her mangekyou sharingan; it could see the future that she wanted and it was capable of making it real. However, the ultimate sharingan techniques always required the ultimate sacrifice. Her mother had told her about sharingan powers that had blinded or killed their users. The sharingan was powerful, but it also had a high price to pay for those that used the forbidden techniques.

What Maida didn't know was that her mangekyou's power was unique, but she knew the consequences of using it.

Nonetheless, she continued doing it, until all her memories were gone. Her life-force was next. She felt how it started to leave her, as if she was still in those branches from before. She didn't let go of him during the process, but eventually her hands left his and her body fell down and remained by his side.

Her remaining mangekyou sharingan lost all its light and so did she. However, she knew that Pedro's dream and his life would not end there.

He was also going to have her other sharingan with him forever.

NEXT CHAPTER / EPISODE: Visions in the Darkness


	12. Chapter 12: Visions in the Darkness

**CHAPTER 12: Visions in the Darkness**

Pedro awakened and all he could see was a dark void, just like empty space in the cosmos itself.

He couldn't feel his body, but he was conscious. The black and empty realm felt timeless, but very familiar nonetheless. He didn't know where he was, and for a moment, he thought he was probably dead and this was what it looked like; but soon, that didn't matter much anymore.

He began to have quick flashbacks of his life, until he reached the last day that he had lived. He was seeing the images in front of himself, rather than just in his mind. They all stopped, and the absolute blackness returned when they reached the time of his battle with Zet and Su.

Then, another image appeared: it was Maida, but he was seeing her from a point of view that was far above her, and her face was not visible. He also saw himself close to her on the ground, but his face wasn't visible either. She did something to him and then, she just lied there at his side. The vision was too far away for him to notice the details, but it was clear that those were Maida and him in-between the remainders of what used to be their village. The place was in ruins, so it seemed like this was after his last battle.

Everything went dark once again. He felt anxious because he wanted to see more. He wanted to know if Maida and the others were alright, even if all the odds were against it. However, what he saw next was completely unexpected, and it had nothing to do with them.

When the images of light returned, they showed a young blonde woman that he had never seen before. She was using a headband from one of the large clans, but the sign on it wasn't clear in the vision. She was inside her house and, apparently, she was preparing something for someone else there, but that other person was not shown. Even though he had never seen her, she looked very familiar. It made no sense for him though.

These new visions were not about him—at least, that's what he thought.

Next, he started to have visions about a young blonde boy. The boy was called Naruto. He was hopeful and energetic, but a little sad at the same time. Naruto had great dreams and goals for his future. He wanted to become a Hokage—the leader of The Leaf—and he shared the same dream as Pedro. Despite their different personalities, Naruto also wanted to bring peace, justice, and happiness for all when he became Hokage.

He didn't know this boy, but as the visions continued, he became more interested in knowing more about him.

Suddenly, the view changed from the young boy to a teenager. Pedro could see how Naruto used an interesting wind-based jutsu that formed a ball of wind and chakra on his hand. The boy had grown, physically and as a ninja too.

The vision changed to Naruto wearing some strange clothes at a completely different place. His eyes were also different. For a second, they reminded Pedro of Zet's eyes when he went into his earth sage mode. Was he a sage like Zet? The place where Naruto was at also had various giant toads. Pedro had never seen this world before, and he definitely had never seen toads that large.

The vision was starting to look silly, until it changed to years later and showed Naruto as an adult. He was wearing the vest of the Kages, and the red color of his hat represented the Land of Fire and The Leaf's clan. He had become the Hokage.

What Pedro saw next left him astonished:

The other four Kages of the other parts of the continent were all there. And all the five Kages extended their hands and united them at the center of the summit. They looked like friends, rather than rivals or enemies. Their clans and the people throughout the continent were living in peace; there were no wars, conflicts, or rivalries. Everyone was happier than ever before, and lives were lost to nature's course, rather than to conflicts and hate.

Naruto's dream and Pedro's dream had been achieved. It looked like Naruto Uzumaki had been the pillar at the center of making them a reality. Even though these were just visions, Pedro felt a great surge of happiness. He realized that fulfilling his grand dream was quite possible.

Then, the five Kages, including Naruto, prepared themselves for what looked like an upcoming confrontation; and Pedro could see that a white snake was moving towards them. Apparently, there was some kind of threat left.

However, Pedro's vision returned to the darkness before he could see anything else. He had mixed feelings: these visions had given doubt, happiness, and worry at the same time. Were they real or was this just part of his imagination? They felt very real.

The visions came back one last time, and they seemed unrelated then.

First, he saw a young boy with black hair and sharingan eyes, just like Maida, but his were not active at all times. He saw a pink-haired girl calling him Sasuke. Then, he saw a man with the Hokage's vest and a large and robust ape beside him. The ape seemed human because he had clothes and was standing on his two legs. Pedro couldn't see their faces because they were facing the other way. He didn't hear what they were talking about either.

Next, he saw another young boy, but this one didn't seem to have anything special like Naruto and Sasuke. He had brown hair and looked normal. The boy was holding a couple of books and looked a little puzzled. There were two adults close to him, but the visions didn't show their faces.

Suddenly, the scenario changed to a large plain field that looked like a desert. And there was a mighty-looking figure standing at the center. It was a man with a long vest and a unique staff-like weapon. He seemed ready for a battle with someone. He looked dark. Nothing about him was fully visible, except the abnormally large amounts of chakra that were coming from him. Clearly, it was a very powerful shinobi, and someone that Pedro had never seen—yet.

Why was he having these visions?

What was his connection to all of them?

Was there any connection to begin with?

He didn't know the answers now. He had no idea that these were visions of the future in the Human Realm, and that he would play a key role in it. However, the one he saw next wasn't unknown for him:

He saw Zet again. Zet was getting ready for a battle with someone who had just arrived.

"I see; I will need to use my most powerful sage mode to fight him," said Zet, and his eyes started to turn yellow, with a violet color surrounding them as well.

Then, the visions changed quickly to the same white snake that had been shown before with Naruto and the other Kages. There was something truly evil about this particular white snake. It felt as if a bottom-less menace was hiding within it. The snake kept coming closer and closer, then it attacked!

It was just a vision, but it seemed very real.

After that, the darkness embraced everything again, and a deep and evil laughter was heard. Somehow, the laugh reminded Pedro of the same white snake that attacked, after moving towards him. It felt like a bad omen.

The visions in the darkness stopped after that. Peace returned to the black void, but Pedro couldn't feel quite in peace after seeing that white snake for the first time. Seeing Zet again wasn't soothing either. However, the multiple visions about this guy named Naruto were like a light of hope. The others were also unknown to him, but none of the visions had more impact on Pedro than those of Naruto and the snake. They were like polar opposites. Naruto made him feel hope and the snake brought a feeling of despair.

After all the visions were gone, he began to feel sleepy and, little by little, he felt that the black void was getting farther and farther away from him. It was as if some force was bringing him back. He could feel it.

Then, he lost all consciousness.

NEXT CHAPTER / EPISODE: Death and The Leaf


End file.
